The Long Road Home
by The King's Soldier
Summary: "The cure for anything is salt water: sweat, tears or the sea." (Isak Dinesen) Clarke makes use of all three in her search for peace. But is peace even possible after all she's done? One chapter for each season of the year following the season 2 finale. ***Winner of Most Underrated Fiction in the Bellarke Fanfiction 2015 Awards***
1. Fall

Disclaimer: I own nothing.

Author's Note: I usually try to stay away from speculating about the future of a show, but I really wanted to write something about Clarke's journey back to Camp Jaha. This will all be AU once season 3 starts, but whatever. This story is going to be four chapters with each chapter covering one of the four seasons over the almost year after what happened at Mount Weather. Chapter one picks up after Clarke walks away from Camp Jaha and covers the more immediate aftermath of that decision. Since Jason Rothenburg has confirmed that two seasons so far lasted about a month each and since the characters were worried about surviving the winter, I'm placing the end of season 2 partway through the fall. And I used Google to estimate all the walking distances. Everything else should be self-explanatory. Enjoy!

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**Fall  
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If someone had told Clarke twenty-four hours ago that she was going to walk away from her people, she would have laughed in their face. And if they had somehow managed to convince her of it, she would have expected it to be the hardest thing she ever did. But it's not. In fact, it's one of the easiest decisions she's made lately. She knew from the minute they left Mount Weather that this needed to happen. The only moment she wavered was when Bellamy tried to stop her. But even Bellamy hadn't been enough. Clarke's guilt is too great for that. She needs to deal with it, and she needs to deal with it alone.

She told a handful of people that she was leaving. Raven, Lincoln and Octavia, Kane, Monty, and Bellamy. (She didn't have the heart to tell her mom. Kane said he'd take care of it after she's gone.) They all seem to think she's going to come back. Even Bellamy with his quiet "May we meet again" seems to believe that they actually will. Clarke doesn't have the heart to tell any of them the truth. This is not some temporary break to recover her strength. She's leaving. For good. And she has no intention of coming back. As far as Camp Jaha is concerned, she's going to walk out into the forest and disappear.

She walks for nearly an hour before realizing that she has no plan. Her mind had never really made it past the leaving part. Now that she's actually managed that, she suddenly has no idea what to do with herself.

Basic survival seems like a good place to start. She's going to need food and water. Her gun is resting in her holster, but there's just the one clip left in it and that probably won't go very far in the long run. She's going to need some supplies if she wants to last more than a few days out here. The most logical conclusion is to go to Finn's bunker. While the former delinquents raided it for specific supplies during their stay in the drop ship, they never actually cleaned the whole thing out. The essentials should still be there.

It doesn't take long to reach her destination. She's mildly surprised at how well she can navigate in the woods considering she's only been on the ground for a couple months. Sometimes it feels like it's been a whole lifetime. Maybe in some ways it has.

The bunker looks just as abandoned as ever. Clarke climbs down the hatch to find that the body of the Grounder is still on the floor beneath the shower curtain Finn used to cover him. The sight of him lying there doesn't bother her this time. And somehow that bothers her more than anything else. She pulls the shower curtain off his body to see if he has a knife. He does. Clarke takes it and slips it into her belt. He doesn't need it now anyway. On an impulse, she folds up the shower curtain and takes that too. It might come in handy.

It takes very little time to go through the tiny bunker. She finds a rucksack in one corner and begins filling it with what little she might need. One of the boxes includes some wire that she could use for fishing. She pulls a nails out of one of the shelves to use for a hook. Further digging results in a rope, an empty canteen, a small first aid kit, a canister of matches, an axe, and a collapsible tent. There's also a blanket that looks fairly warm, which Clarke rolls up and ties to the top of the rucksack.

The tiny two-headed deer Finn made for her is still sitting on the table. She picks it up and carefully slips it into a side pocket of the bag. As much as the sight of it hurts, she can't bring herself to leave it here. It's all she has left of him. Of any of them, really. What little else she owns is still back in Camp Jaha. Not that she really had any personal effects anyway, other than her father's watch, which is already on her wrist. But she can't go back now. Only forward. That part of her life is done. It's time to move on.

After giving the place one last look, Clarke climbs out of the bunker and leaves the dead Grounder behind. Once outside, she just stands there for a moment, trying to decide where to go. The ground's a big place. She could go pretty much anywhere. But her gaze is instinctively drawn in the direction of Mount Weather. She can't leave quite yet. She still has one last bit of unfinished business. She may not be deserving of rest, but she can at least give it to those she killed. Besides, her mother's going to discover her absence pretty soon, and once she does, she'll probably make them send out a search party. But Clarke doesn't want to be found. And like it or not, Mount Weather is the last place anyone will look for her right now.

She sets off in the direction of the mountain.

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It's a long walk to Mount Weather. The sun has already begun its descent by the time Clarke reaches the giant metal door. She stands in front of it for a long time, wondering if she even has the courage to go in. Then Maya's face flashes before her eyes, and she realizes it doesn't matter. She murdered all of these people regardless of whether or not they were innocent. She owes them at least this much.

The back-up generator is still on, so the elevators still function. She rides one down to level five. She expects it to feel like the longest minute of her life, but the next thing she knows she's stepping out and turning the corner into the dining hall. It looks like something out of a horror film. Bodies are slumped everywhere. They dropped dead in the middle of everything. Eating, talking, kicking a ball, playing the piano. One minute they were going about their lives, and the next they were being burned alive. Now the only sound is the faint mechanical hum of the vents bringing down air. Air that Clarke let in. Air that killed them.

Before she deals with the bodies, Clarke makes herself walk through the halls. She looks in all of the living quarters, taking in all of the little signs of life. Paintings, books, stuffed animals, jewelry. These were the homes of ordinary people. People who didn't ask to be born into this world. They were only trying to stay alive.

Even so, it doesn't truly hit her until she reaches the school. The room she walks into is full of craft supplies and bright pictures. The small chairs around the tables and the toy bins in the corner make it clear that this was a room for younger children. That hurts badly enough. But what truly grabs her are the pictures on the wall. Some are done in pencil and some in paint. They cover a variety of subjects, but they all have shaky names scribbled in the corner. Clarke can feel her eyes beginning to burn as she looks at them.

And then it gets worse. Some of the drawings show clumsily drawn people standing on green grass beneath a yellow sun in a blue sky. They look like the drawings Clarke used to make as a child dreaming of Earth. And that's when it finally slams home. These people weren't so different from her. In fact, they even had the same dream – the ground. The difference is that the people of Mount Weather will never have their dream realized because Clarke stole it away to give it to her own people.

She sinks to her knees on the brightly colored carpet as tears begin to run down her face. Harsh, ugly sobs force themselves out of her mouth, but she can't find it in herself to care. In that moment, it no longer matters that these people would have killed her own. All that matters are those tiny little hands drawing pictures of a ground they will never see. Hands that have now been stilled forever because Clarke decided the ground should go to someone else.

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She wakes up to find herself lying on the floor of the same classroom. Apparently she cried herself to sleep. Her watch says it's almost morning. The sun won't quite be up yet, but that hardly matters. Clarke has done what little mourning she can. Now there's work to do.

She pulls a set of sheets from the nearest housing unit and takes it to level five. First she piles on wooden items. Chairs, benches, small tables, anything she can find. Enough to start a good fire. She drags it all to the elevator and rides to the top. After lugging all the wood outside, she arranges it in a fashion similar to the funeral pyre from Tondc.

With that done, she heads back down for the bodies. She starts at one end of the dining hall, piling bodies onto the sheets and dragging them to the elevator. Once it's full, she rides it up to the top and takes them outside to the pile of wood. It seems ironic that only now in death are these people finally coming to the ground they fought so hard for in life. Clarke places as many of the bodies as she can on the wood pile. Then she pulls out a match and sets it on fire.

For a moment she stands there, unsure of what to do. She feels the strong urge to say something, but these were not her people. She knows nothing about any of them, including what their funerals traditions might have been. In the end, she settles for the Grounder version.

"Yu gonplei ste odon," she says to the pyre.

The words themselves would have meant nothing to these people. But it seems fitting somehow to bid them farewell in the language of the people whose blood kept them alive. She stands there for a moment longer just to be sure the fire is strong enough to do its job. Then she goes down to gather more bodies.

The rest of the day is spent moving bodies. She gathers up a group, takes them outside, places them on the fire, adds more wood if necessary, says the same Grounder phrase, and then goes back down into the mountain to start again. It's mind-numbing work. But it gives her something to focus on, and the ache of her arms reminds her that she's alive when all these people are dead. When she gets hungry, she eats some of the food still sitting on the tables in the dining hall. It should bother her to eat food left by dead people, but she's beginning to think that she's past being unnerved by just about anything anymore.

The sun slowly crosses from one horizon to the next as she works. It's nearly setting when Clarke sets the last group of bodies, including Dante Wallace, onto the pyre. Three hundred and forty bodies all told. Three hundred and forty-one if she counts Maya, who she plans on burying instead. (But not including Cage, who Lincoln left out in the woods to rot like he deserves.) Three hundred and forty-one people killed by the throwing of one lever. It's almost too horrific to imagine. Almost, but not quite. And that makes it all even worse.

Clarke leaves the smoldering pyre behind and heads to the Reaper tunnels. She found a tone generator just in case, but there's not a Reaper in sight when she pushes open the door. Maybe the Grounders have already reclaimed all of their people.

Fox's tiny body is still resting inside of the giant bin. Clarke pulls her out and gently wraps her in a sheet before carrying her back to the main door where Maya's body waits. She takes both bodies out past the smoldering pyre to a spot a short distance away from the giant metal door. Then she takes up the shovel she found in a supply closet and begins to dig.

It takes a considerable amount of time to dig two holes and then refill them. The sun is dipping beneath the horizon by the time she finishes, and the pyre has finally burned itself out. Clarke's arms are on fire, but she's not quite done yet. She takes some sticks from the tree line and ties them together to make two small crosses. Then she uses the Grounder's knife to carve the names onto them before placing them in the ground.

"In peace may you leave this shore," she says as she looks down at the two graves. "In love may you find the next. Safe passage on your travels. May we meet again."

The words feel right for honoring Fox. She was from the Ark, after all. But they seem to fit Maya as well. She might not have been one of Clarke's people, but she protected them as though she was. And for that Clarke could never have repaid her.

By that point the sun is all but gone. As much as Clarke dislikes the idea of spending the night in the mountain, she knows starting out now would be a bad idea. Things between the Grounders and the Sky People are a complete unknown, and she doesn't fancy the idea of being shot by a jumpy scout. So instead she heads back into the mountain one last time.

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She sleeps on a bed that night. A real bed. It's a bit easier knowing that the mountain has been emptied of bodies. Plus she's exhausted from all of the carrying and digging. All too soon she's opening her eyes to a wall clock that says it's morning again. Time to get going.

Before she leaves, Clarke decides to trade her clothes in for something more durable. She manages to find some jeans that fit and look a little less worn, as well as a grey shirt with long sleeves and a hood. She also locates some new socks and trades in her shoes for a pair of boots that look far more durable. Her black gloves and faded blue jacket she keeps. She makes a point of grabbing some extra pair of socks too, as well as some spare clothing. In particular she packs a thick, dark blue sweater. Winter is on the way, and Clarke has no idea how cold it gets around here. She needs to be prepared just in case.

With all that done, she heads down to the school one final time. This time she sets her teeth before she goes in. She gathers up some pencils, a few sketch pads, and a set of watercolors and brushes that she puts into her bag as well. She hasn't done much drawing since coming to the ground, but now she has all the time in the world. Might as well give it a try.

As she turns to leave, she catches sight of the drawings on the walls. She pulls off one of the ones with grass and a sky and carefully slips it inside one of her sketch pads where it won't get crumpled. Then she heads out and doesn't look back.

She makes a quick stop in the mess hall to fill her canteen and puts some food in a cloth napkin for later. Then she takes the elevator up to the top. Once there, she pulls open the gun locker. It won't hurt to have extra ammo. There's no telling where she'll end up or how much she might need. As an afterthought, she slings a rifle over her shoulder and packs some ammo for that as wall. It'll be easier to hunt with than her handgun.

Finally satisfied that she's ready, Clarke walks out the giant metal door. She's barely made it past the ashes of the pyre and out into the morning sunlight when she stops dead.

Jasper is standing a few feet away. He freezes too at the sight of her. For a moment they just stand there, staring at one another. It occurs to Clarke that he must've hiked through the night to get here this early. It shows a blatant disregard for his own safety that bothers her. The fact that he's carrying a rifle does little to ease her worry. In fact, it actually scares her more. How easy would it be for him to shoot her right now? He certainly looks hurt and angry enough to do it. And if he did, would she even care? Jasper's hand clenches and unclenches around the stock as if the possibility has occurred to him as well. But then he squares his shoulders.

"I'm here for Maya," he says, his voice cold and hoarse.

"I buried her," Clarke says softly. She points over in the direction of the two crosses. "Her and Fox."

Jasper gives her a curt nod and then turns in the direction of the graves, clearly finished with her. Clarke resumes her own walk toward the tree line. She's only made it a few steps when she turns back around.

"Jasper?" she blurts out. Jasper turns, a cold expression on his face. He clearly hates her. Clarke doesn't blame him. She killed the girl he loved. And nothing she does could ever make up for that. They both know she wouldn't change her decision. She would do anything to keep her people safe. Even if it makes them hate her. But Maya deserved better, and so does Jasper.

"If I could take her place, I would," Clarke says finally. She means it. If giving up her life would buy him some peace, if it would help any of them, then she would do it in a heartbeat.

"But you can't," Jasper says flatly, his jaw muscles tightening. "She's dead. They all are."

Then he's walking off toward the graves. Clarke swallows hard. She knows he's right. But that doesn't make his rejection hurt any less.

She stands there for a moment, trying to think of something to say. Anything. But nothing comes. So finally she just turns away and heads for the trees, leaving Jasper alone staring down at Maya's grave. She doesn't dare look back.

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She doesn't really know where to go, so she points herself away from the mountain and just walks. She walks the whole day without running into another human being. A deer crosses her path at one point and she thinks about shooting it so she'll have some meat, but then it looks her in the eyes and she can't bring herself to lift the rifle. So instead she watches in silence as it wanders off into the forest.

The second day is more of the same. She keeps walking aimlessly in the same direction. She has no idea where she's going, but she can't find it in herself to care. It doesn't really matter. What does matter is that she keeps walking, keeps putting distance between herself and Camp Jaha. The fact that she's walking through Grounder territory doesn't bother her at all. There's one point of about an hour where she knows she's definitely being followed, but even then she can't see her pursuer. And whoever it is has the good sense to leave her alone. Part of Clarke actually hopes she does run across a warrior so she can get into a fight. She can't decide if it's because of all her pent up anger or because she's suddenly turned suicidal. But in the end it doesn't really matter because she doesn't see another soul all day.

At night she makes a campfire just like she did last night. She figures she can't be far from Tondc now. Part of her begins to wonder if Lexa might be there. The commander had made the village her headquarters of sorts during the preparation for battle. It's been four days, but she could still be there. Clarke is almost tempted to go find out. If anyone could understand what she's going through, it's Lexa. But at the same time, Clarke knows she couldn't look the commander in the eye anymore. Not without seeing Lexa's hardened face admitting that she's just betrayed everyone Clarke cares about. Clarke may understand the decision now, but she still can't forgive the personal betrayal. She's not sure she'll ever be able to.

Her train of thought is interrupted by a slight rustling just outside the ring of light created by the campfire. Clarke has her gun out in a flash.

"Who's there?" she calls.

In answer, a figure steps out into the light. Clarke's eyes widen as she recognizes them.

"I could have killed you," Indra says flatly.

"You could have tried," Clarke fires back.

She lowers her gun, but makes sure not to set it down. Indra looks pointedly at the campfire, as if asking permission to sit. Clarke shrugs in answer.

"What are you doing here?" she asks wearily.

"Looking for you," Indra says as she crouches down beside the fire. She extends her hands as if to warm them, but she seems to be watching Clarke from the corner of her eye. "The commander went to speak with your people yesterday. They said you had left. I told my scouts to keep an eye out for you."

"Why?" Clarke asks.

"You destroyed the Mountain Men," Indra says, looking up at her. "You were left with only five warriors, and yet you still defeated them. That makes you a great warrior yourself. "

Clarke doesn't bother to point out that she hardly qualifies as a warrior. Neither do Monty, Jasper, or Maya, for that matter. She also doesn't point out that they were only forced to take the mountain alone because the Grounders had abandoned them.

"You think I'm a threat?" she asks with a dark chuckle.

"I do not know," Indra says. She looks at Clarke through narrowed eyes.

"Well, I'm not," Clarke says bitterly. "I'll be gone in the morning, and then you won't have to worry about keeping an eye on me."

"You are leaving your people," Indra says. She clearly doesn't approve.

"They'll be fine without me," Clarke says. Her gaze drifts to the campfire, which looks like a smaller version of the pyre she built at Mount Weather.

"You are their leader," Indra says strongly.

"I did my job, okay?" Clarke practically yells. Indra's eyebrows lift a fraction in the closest she ever gets to looking surprised. "I saved them. And to do it, I killed three hundred and forty-one people. And now every time I look at them..." She trails off and shakes her head. "Why am I even explaining this to you?"

She expects Indra to launch into a lecture on leadership and the sacrifices necessary in battle, but what comes instead surprises her.

"Among our people, there is a thing we call battle sickness," Indra says quietly. "It is common among seconds who face battle for the first time, but it may come in older warriors as well. It comes when a warrior is forced to make many kills that he wishes he did not. Those who suffer from it are said to be haunted by the dead."

"How do you cure it?" Clarke asks softly.

"You must make peace with their spirits," Indra says. "It is different for every warrior. It may take days or months. But until you make peace with the dead, you cannot go on living."

There's something in her eyes that says this is more than just an old wives' tale.

"You had it, didn't you?" Clarke says. It's more a statement than a question.

"Once," Indra said quietly. Her gaze drops to the fire. "When I was a young second."

"What did you do?"

"I went to the sea," Indra says. Clarke is mildly surprised that she answered. "I stayed there alone for many days while I made my own peace. How is none of your concern. You must discover your own way. But one morning I woke and the ghosts were gone."

Clarke lets her own gaze drift to the fire as she thinks that over. According to the maps she's seen, the sea is to the east. The same direction she's been instinctively walking for the last day. Maybe it's a sign of some kind.

"You said the commander went to see my people," she says suddenly, looking back up.

"She wished to discuss the state of the alliance," Indra says. "Your people have agreed to negotiate a truce. But they will meet only with me. Not the commander."

That doesn't entirely surprise Clarke. Indra was the one who set Lincoln free to join them. And she spared Octavia's life in the tunnels when, according to Lincoln, tradition demanded her death. It makes sense that the Sky People would trust her more than Lexa.

"How is she?" Clarke asks in spite of herself. She doesn't have to say who she means.

"She worries for you," Indra says. "She hides it well, but it is there."

"If she's so worried about me, then she shouldn't have left me alone in front of Mount Weather," Clarke says bitterly.

"She made her choice," Indra says with a shrug. Something about that gesture tells Clarke that some part of Indra doesn't agree with Lexa either, although she'd never admit it.

"The sea is to the east," Indra says, pushing herself to her feet in a silent signal that she's done talking. "If you leave at sunrise, you should reach it by sunset."

"When you see my people-" Clarke begins.

"I will say nothing of you," Indra tells her. "Neither will my scouts. This is a journey you must make alone."

"Thank-you," Clarke says quietly.

Indra nods and then she's gone, stepping out of the firelight into the darkness of the trees. Clarke sits there for a long time puzzling over that conversation. She can't figure out why Indra decided to help her. Finally she gives up. She has a feeling she'll never understand Indra. Instead, she lies down on the cold ground and tries to go to sleep.

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It seems she's only just closed her eyes when she finds herself being awakened by rays of early morning sunlight. She kicks some dirt over her fire's ashes, eats some of the food she took from Mount Weather, and sets off again. This time she walks east with a purpose, repeatedly checking her direction to be sure she's going the right way. The walk is long, but she hardly minds. There's something about the forest that makes everything else seem to fade away. It's almost as if she's the only thing that exists out here.

The sun is setting when she finally reaches the sea. It's a magnificent sight. The water stretches away as far as she can see. It rolls up against the sandy beach in waves before pulling back again. The gentle whooshing sound is strangely calming. A breeze rolls off the water, caressing her face and filling her nose with the scent of salt.

Clarke drops her pack on the sandy shore and strips off her socks and shoes. The sand feels strange against her bare feet. It's rough, but not unpleasant. She squishes her toes against the grainy substance as she tries to get used to the odd feeling.

Once her feet adjust, she walks slowly across the sand to the very edge of the water. A wave comes in, dousing her feet with cold water. Clarke yelps in surprise. The wave retreats and takes some of the sand with it, which causes her feet to sink a bit. She stands very still as another wave comes in. It's still cold, but not quite as shocking. Once more, her feet sink further into the sand. A few waves later and she can no longer see her toes. Clarke can feel the corners of her mouth threatening to turn up into something resembling a smile.

She rolls up her jeans and pulls her feet out of the sand so she can wade further into the water. It no longer feels as cold as it first did. She wades out until the water is almost to her knees. It's amazingly clear. She can see her feet resting on the squishy sand below. There are tiny objects on the seabed as well. She pushes up her sleeve before bending down and picking one up. It's a seashell. The first Clarke has ever seen. She runs her finger carefully across the spherical pattern, and this time she can't help just the barest hint of a smile.

The sun is just barely visible over the horizon. Its last light has turned the sky, and by extension the sea, a collage of pinks and oranges and reds. The sight is truly awe-inspiring. As she stands knee deep in salt water with a seashell in her head and the brilliant sunset before her, Clarke begins to think that Indra was right. This is the sort of place that could bring healing.

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She sets up her tent on the beach about halfway between the water and the tree line. It turns out the sand is far more comfortable to sleep on than the ground in the woods. And when the sun comes up the next morning, it's even more beautiful than the sunset.

Clarke runs barefoot on the beach her first morning. There's something strangely liberating about it. Besides, she might as well keep herself in shape. Then she turns her attention to other issues. She spends some time chopping down small trees with the axe. Most of it gets set aside as firewood, but she also uses some longer pieces to construct a frame that she ties together with some of the wire she brought. She ties the shower curtain inside of it to create a water basin like the one they had back at the drop ship. There's a small river a ways back into the woods, and it takes a few trips with her small canteen to get the basin half full. Along the way she picks up some plants, berries and nuts that she knows to be edible. She ties more of the wire into attempted snares which she sets in the forest in the hopes of trapping some smaller animals. She also rigs up a fishing pole, although she doesn't manage to catch anything. Not that it really matters. She's going to have lots of time to get good at it.

That night she lays on the beach and stares up at the stars. But that makes her think of looking at them with Finn, and that just makes his loss sting all over again. It's hard to believe he's only been gone a few weeks. It feels like so long since she's heard his voice. Thinking of his death makes her think of Lexa, which makes her think of Mount Weather, which reminds her of exactly why she's out here in the first place. And just like that, her tiny sliver of peace is gone.

She doesn't get much sleep that night.

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When the sun finally comes up in the morning, she's decided it's time to set about taking Indra's advice. She needs to find a way to make peace with the dead. She sits on the beach for a long time listening to the waves as she tries to figure out how in the world to go about that. Then she remembers the pencils and sketch pads in her pack. Dante seemed to find some level of peace in his art. Maybe Clarke can do the same.

She decides to start all the way back at the beginning. If she's going to make peace with the dead, she might as well make it with all of them. So she starts with Atom. She draws him lying on the grass with his face burned and the small knife lying on the grass beside him. It doesn't hurt as much as she expects it to. Atom was dying anyway. What she did was mercy. But it was still her fault, and so she draws him out as best she can.

When she finishes with him, she decides to draw Wells. She might not have killed him directly, but he got himself arrested so he could come to the ground with her. In some ways that makes it her fault. Her throat tightens up as she carefully sketches out his face. Things have moved so fast on the ground that's she's barely had time to think about his loss. But now that she does, she misses him. Wells is the one person she wouldn't mind having around right now. The one person who knew her enough that his presence wouldn't make her feel guilty.

She chooses to draw him the way she thinks he must have looked his last night sitting quietly on watch rather than sprawled out with his throat slit like they had found him the next morning. When she finishes, the sight of his face makes her heart ache. She needs his quiet manner right now. He would know exactly what to say. What she wouldn't give to go back to quietly playing chess with him. She misses those days. Actually, she misses her best friend. Misses him a lot more than she realized.

Even so, it's not until Charlotte's scared face begins to take shape on the next page that tears finally start pouring down Clarke's face. It takes a long time before they finally stop.

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So how was it? Please leave a review and let me know what you thought. It would literally make my day. The next chapter of this will be up in a few days. In the mean time, feel free to check out some of my other stories for this show. "Exit the Hero" is my take on why Clarke decided to leave and her thoughts during her good-bye to Bellamy, so it's basically a prologue to this story. "This Is Life Without You" is a sort of companion piece to this story that shows Lexa trying to come to terms with her betrayal of Clarke as the coalition crumbles around her. It includes her visit to Camp Jaha that Indra references in this chapter as well as another event that will be shown from Clarke's point of view in the next chapter of this story. Thanks for reading!


	2. Winter

Disclaimer: I own nothing.

Author's Note: Thanks to the people who reviewed chapter one. You guys rock. This chapter picks up pretty much where that one left off. It also includes some original characters. I don't usually like to write OCs, but they worked their way into this story and refused to leave. Plus, they gave this chapter an arc that I really like, so I left them in. Hopefully they're okay and don't seem out of place in this world. This chapter also includes Clarke's point of view on a scene from my story "This Is Life Without You," but it'll make sense even if you haven't read that. Enjoy!

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**Winter**

The beach begins to get colder as time goes on. The sweater Clarke took from Mount Weather is coming out more and more, and she's taken to wearing the hood up on her shirt to protect her ears from the constant breeze off the sea. It becomes clear very quickly that she's going to need some form of shelter besides the tent. She scouts up and down the beach and eventually finds some low cliffs not far down. There's a room-sized cave in them with a tiny entrance that's almost invisible unless someone is actually looking for it. Perfect.

Clarke moves her things to the cave and even hangs a few deer hides across the entrance to keep out the cold air. Shooting the deer is simple. Skinning them correctly definitely takes some learning, but she finally gets it figured out. (The first deer she kills is the worst. She gets her hands covered in blood while skinning it, and seeing the physical representation of the metaphor in her head triggers a full-on panic attack. It takes her a good fifteen minutes to get her breathing back to normal. By that point she's curled up against a tree crying and wanting her mom. She hasn't had an attack like this since the night after her dad died. But Abby's not there, so Clarke has to find a way to calm down on her own. She doesn't have that problem with the next deer or any of the ones after that. But the memory of it still haunts her for days.)

She gets better at a lot of things as the weeks go by. Her traps get more effective and so does her fishing prowess, although she has a feeling that catching meat is going to get a lot harder as winter rolls in. She's started storing up food already. It won't be enough to last the whole season, so she'll have to supplement that with actually hunting her own game. But she should be able to make it through the winter.

Her days fall into a steady pattern. She gets up in the mornings and runs along the beach, regardless of how cold it is. Although she no longer does it barefoot and she makes a point of staying out of the water. After running, she does some other basic exercises like push-ups. Not many, just enough to know she could hold her own if she had to. Then she hunts or chops wood or collects food or gets water from the river that's definitely beginning to show hints of ice near the bank. She tries teaching herself to throw the knife she took from the dead Grounder, but she's not very good at it. Somehow her form is off and she doesn't have anyone else around to mimic. But she gives it her best effort anyway.

Whenever she decides she's done enough working out and survival prep, she turns to drawing. Sometimes she sits on the beach and sketches while listening to the waves come in and out. Other times she retreats into the cave and does it by firelight. She draws death in all of its forms – Charlotte leaping off the cliff, Tondc being crushed by the missile, the dining hall of Mount Weather filled with corpses. And when she's drawn every single one of her victims that she can picture, she turns to drawing others who have died. She sketches out the boy who broke his neck in the drop ship landing, Dax with his rifle pointed at Bellamy, the harvest chamber in Mount Weather. She fills one sketch book after another with death. It feels cathartic, in some twisted way.

But not cathartic enough. She dreams of the dead almost every night. She wakes up sweating or crying or even screaming. Some nights she drifts in and out, only getting about an hour of sleep at a time. Others she gives up entirely and sits out on the beach hugging her knees to her chest as the calming sound of the waves fills her ears. She wonders at one point about marking her skin for each kill the way some of the Grounders do to see if wearing her penance will help. But in the end she decides she doesn't have enough skin to hold them all. So she just keeps on going the same way in the hopes that eventually it will be enough.

She's been at the beach over a month when she looks up from a sketchbook one day to see a girl standing a short distance behind her. Clarke nearly jumps out of her skin. For a second the girl looks like Charlotte, but her clothes are definitely those of a Grounder.

"Who are you?" Clarke blurts out. She knows there's a Grounder village somewhere nearby, but she hasn't seen another human being since arriving at the beach. It occurs to then her that this girl might not even speak English since she can't be more than eleven.

"Talia," the girl says. So she does speak English. That means she's in training to be a warrior, although she looks far too young. But then again, there's a braid on the side of her head and a knife at her belt that she's fingering as if she knows how to use it.

"I'm Clarke," Clarke says. She's still not entirely sure what to make of this. The girl is staring at her intently as if trying to decide what to do. Clarke herself is sitting very still while she debates whether or not she should draw her gun.

"I know," Talia says.

"You know?" Clarke asks in confusion.

"You defeated the Mountain," Talia says. "The chief told us to stay away. That you are a fierce warrior and we should not anger you."

It seems the stories of what Clarke did at Mount Weather are spreading. She's not sure how she feels about that. The whole reason she came out here was to get away from what she did. But apparently that's not possible.

"So what are you doing here?" she asks curiously.

"The other seconds say I am too young to be a warrior," Talia says as she squares her shoulders. "They say I will be afraid of battle."

So she's trying to prove herself. Interesting.

"You don't look afraid to me," Clarke says. Talia shakes her head, and Clarke can feel her tense muscles relaxing. There's something about this girl that she likes.

"What are you doing?" Talia asks, looking at the sketchbook on Clarke's lap.

"Drawing," Clarke says. "You can come look, if you want."

Talia hesitates briefly as if unsure whether or not she dares get closer.

"I don't bite," Clarke assures her.

Talia's young pride finally wins out and she slowly walks forward until she's standing at Clarke's shoulder. Clarke holds up the sketchpad, which currently shows a half-finished drawing of Fox lying in the bin in the Reaper tunnels.

"Who is that?" Talia asks curiously.

"A friend," Clark says quietly. "She died."

"My mother died," Talia says. Her eyes drop briefly, but not before Clarke sees her pain.

"I'm sorry," she says. "I know how hard it is to lose a parent. My dad died."

"Was he a warrior like you?" Talia asks curiously.

Clarke has to think about that one for a moment. Her father might not have fought in battle, but he was willing to die for what he believed in.

"Yes," she says finally. "He was."

Talia glances back down at the sketchpad and nods as if she has just decided something.

"I must go," she says. She starts to turn away, but then turns back. "Can I come again?"

"I..." Clarke hesitates again. She came out to this beach to avoid people. But there is such a deep pain and loneliness hiding in Talia's eyes that she can't seem to make herself say no. "I tell you what. If you promise not to tell anyone, then you can come back. Okay?"

Talia nods, and for a moment she looks as if she's about to smile. But then she turns and runs back up the beach, quickly disappearing into the trees. Clarke stares after her for a long moment before finally turning back to her sketchpad with a shake of her head.

She dreams of Charlotte that night. Everything from her crying out in her sleep to the way she would smile at Bellamy to her desperate act of throwing herself off the cliff. She wakes up with tears on her cheeks. Sadly, she's getting used to that by now.

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Two days come and go with no sign of Talia, and Clarke begins to wonder if she's seen the last of the young girl. On the third day, she's standing out on the beach throwing her knife at a target she carved into a tree. Her aim is improving some, but it still needs serious work.

"You throw it wrong," a familiar voice says.

Clarke manages to look over her shoulder without jumping this time. Talia is standing a short distance away. How she got there without making any noise is beyond Clarke. Then she sees the boy standing right behind Talia. He looks to be about fourteen. His gaze is far harsher than Talia's, and a sword hangs from his belt. If his right arm wasn't in a sling, Clarke would be seriously worried for her safety.

"This is Manon," Talia says. "My brother. He did not believe I had spoken to you."

"I thought we agreed you wouldn't tell anyone," Clarke says pointedly. Talia shrugs.

"He can keep a secret," she says. She motions at Clarke's knife sticking out of the bottom of the tree. "I can teach you to do it right."

"Okay," Clarke says with a hint of a smile.

"We should not be here," Manon says edgily, his hard eyes still on Clarke.

"She will not bite," Talia tells him with a roll of her eyes. At another time, Clarke might have chuckled. But right now she just doesn't have any laughter left in her.

Talia walks over to the tree to retrieve the knife. Manon hesitates before taking another step toward Clarke. He looks her up and down with his hard stare.

"You do not look like a warrior," he says bluntly.

"Neither do you," Clarke shoots back. Manon's eyes narrow, and for a moment she worries that was exactly the wrong thing to say. But then he nods.

"You show spirit," he says as if that somehow explains everything.

"Thanks," Clarke says slowly, unsure of exactly how to take that.

Talia comes back then holding the knife. She holds it out to Clarke expectantly.

"You must not turn your wrist so much," she says.

"How about you show me?" Clarke tells her.

Talia lines up with the tree, obviously proud to show off her skills. She draws her arm back and releases the knife. It strikes the bottom of Clarke's carved target, but it's better than any of her own throws have been.

"Nice," Clarke says, impressed.

"I have been practicing," Talia says proudly.

She runs toward the tree to retrieve the knife. Clarke glances over at Manon, who is still standing there strangely silent.

"Your problem is not your wrist," he says with an unreadable expression. "You misjudge your distance. You must throw it by the blade if you wish to hit the tree from here."

Talia returns with the knife and hands it to Clarke.

"Now you try it," she says.

Clarke takes the knife and puts her feet in line with the tree. She carefully lines up the knife, holding it by the blade this time as Manon suggested. Then she pulls back her arm in the best mimic she can of Talia's style. She releases the knife –

– and it thuds into the bottom of the target. She missed the center, but only by a couple inches. It's the closest she's ever come. She looks over at Talia and is surprised to see that she's smiling as well. She looks like Charlotte when she smiles.

Manon is watching his sister with a strange expression. Then he looks up at Clarke and she sees something in his eyes that looks strangely like gratitude.

"You need practice," he says flatly. But his words no longer hold an edge.

It's only as Talia runs toward the tree with a smile still on her face that Clarke suddenly realizes she's smiling too. It's the first time she's smiled since reaching the beach. Part of her immediately feels guilty. She killed three hundred and forty-one people. She doesn't deserve to be happy. But another, smaller part of her silently decides that maybe having company around is exactly what she needs.

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Talia and Manon quickly make a habit out of visiting the beach every few days. They never stay long. Mostly they work on Clarke's knife skills. Talia is also learning to use a sword, and she begins teaching Clarke what she knows. Manon's healing arm, which Clarke learns was broken in a building collapse, makes it impossible for him to participate in these spars. But he sits on the sidelines and points out all of their mistakes. He seems like a very serious and critical person. Talia, by contrast, quickly shows herself to be a lover of fun. She smiles often, and it warms Clarke's heart.

On the days when they don't come to the beach, Clarke continues with her same routine. She runs, chops wood, hunts, and draws. One day she actually runs into a large bear. It's utterly terrifying, but she manages to shoot it and then turns its skin into something of a rug for her cave. Talia seems to think it makes her invincible, and even Manon is slightly impressed.

It's about two weeks after the visits start that Clarke runs out of paper. She thinks about just dealing with it, but the ghosts of the dead are still very much haunting her dreams. So finally she decides she'll have to trek back to Mount Weather for more. It's a six-day journey, three there and three back, but there's really no way around it.

Once again, Clarke doesn't see a soul the whole trip. Part of her wonders if Lexa or Indra have purposefully told the Grounders to stay clear of her. She wouldn't be entirely surprised. Either way, she reaches Mount Weather without incident. She's on high alert as she approaches the giant metal door. It wouldn't do to run into a Grounder or an Arker. She notices with interest that there are flowers on Maya's grave. Jasper. Thankfully they look a few days old, so it's unlikely that he's here. Still, she keeps her eyes and ears open as she makes her way inside.

Somebody has definitely been in here since her absence. The guns have been cleaned out, as have many of the other supplies. But she still manages to find several sketchpads down in the school. She grabs some extra pencils too just in case. Then she heads back out.

She makes a quick stop as the graves before leaving. She's drawn an extra picture of both Fox and Maya, and she places the folded images at the foot of the crosses. Any Arker who sees it will know she was here, but Jasper's probably the only one who still visits and Clarke has a feeling he won't care one bit about trying to find her.

She walks as far as she can before the sun sets, at which point she makes camp. Being this close to Tondc and Camp Jaha makes her jumpy. Part of her keeps expecting Indra to come out of the shadows again, but no one appears. In the end, Clarke actually manages to get a few hours of sleep.

The sun comes up all too soon and she sets off again. She's only been walking for a few hours when she suddenly hears the sounds of a fight breaking out. Worried that some of her people might be involved, Clarke moves in the direction of the sound. She doesn't have to go far before she catches sight of Grounders in the trees ahead. There appear to be two distinctly marked groups fighting each other. Which makes it definitely not her problem.

As she starts to slip back into the trees, one of the warriors yells something in Trigedasleng. Talia has been trying to teach Clarke the language, and she's actually gotten quite good at it, although she's certainly no expert yet. But she understands that the warrior is saying to find the commander. And then comes the phrase "kill her." Clarke's eyes widen at the implication. Lexa's here, and she's in trouble. And as much as Clarke wants to wash her hands and walk away, something in her just can't do it.

"Damn it," she hisses.

She doesn't have time to wonder where Lexa is. She just picks a direction and runs as fast as she can without making too much noise. She's learned that moving noiselessly in the woods is all but impossible, but that doesn't mean she has to sound like a rampaging pauna.

The ground seems to be sloping upward. That's good. Lexa would want the high ground. Then the trees are breaking and Clarke is coming out into a small clearing on the side of a very gentle hill. She stumbles to a halt as she catches sight of a large warrior a short distance away. His fist is slamming into someone, who crumples to the ground. The side of their face becomes visible for a brief instant as they fall.

It's Lexa.

She's clearly been disoriented by the blow because she's struggling just to roll over. The warrior has his sword over his head, and then it's crashing down. Clarke doesn't even have time to think. She yanks her gun from its holster and squeezes the trigger. The warrior jerks from the impact. He whirls around, a spot of blood blooming on his chest. His eyes widen as he sees Clarke for the first time. She quickly squeezes the trigger again. The warrior falls without a sound. His body rolls down the incline a bit before coming to a stop. He's dead.

Clarke looks up only long enough to see that Lexa is still alive. Then she turns away. Lexa still seems slightly disoriented and Clarke has her hood up, so there's a chance she can get out of this without being recognized.

She's only made it one step before Lexa's voice crushes that hope.

"Clarke!"

Clarke freezes mid stride. For a moment she considers just walking away. But she knows in her heart that she can't. Even in her deepest betrayal, Lexa still gave an explanation. She's already seen Clarke here. The least Clarke can do is tell her why.

She pushes back her hood and forces herself to turn around. Lexa's face seems to leap as she realizes she was right. Her mouth very nearly smiles. But then the expression disappears. It's replaced by one of pain. Clarke can feel her stomach twist, both at the surge of happiness and then at the sudden drop. They both know they can't go back to where they used to be. Too much has happened.

"Why?" Lexa asks. She doesn't have to elaborate further. She wants to know why Clarke would save her life after her betrayal.

"My people are safer with you in charge of the coalition," Clarke says. Her tone is void of emotion. There may be a part of her that still cares for Lexa, but she doesn't dare let it out now. Because with that will also come the pain of Lexa's betrayal, and if just seeing Lexa's face has thrown her for this much of a loop, then she can't afford to unpack any of that emotion.

"You may be heartless, Lexa, but at least you're smart," she says instead. She tries to say it coldly, but she knows Lexa will remember those words. She'll understand that despite Clarke's pain, this decision was driven by emotion just as much as her decision to save Lexa from the pauna. She's just hurting too much to admit it.

Lexa swallows, and Clarke's intimate knowledge of the commander's subtle mannerisms tells her that Lexa has indeed understood.

"Clarke, I-" Lexa begins. Clarke can't bear to let her finish that sentence. Whatever is about to come out is going to be fraught with emotion, and it just might break Clarke.

"I understand why you did it," she blurts out. And she does. She understands choosing her people over someone else's. But the betrayal of their friendship, of whatever the hell they were… That's the part that keeps her awake at night. She briefly drops her gaze to the grass, unable to meet Lexa's eyes as she bears this piece of her soul. "I ended up making the same choice. But I still can't forgive you for it anymore than I can forgive myself."

She can see the wheels turning in Lexa's mind as she processes that. Then Lexa nods.

"Your heart is still strong," she says.

It sounds dangerously close to an apology. Her voice trembles as she says it, and Clarke nearly snaps right there. This is the one person in the world who might actually understand what she's going through. Who might even be able to help her learn how to live with it. Everything in Clarke is demanding that she yell, cry, fall to her knees, something. Anything. Whatever it takes to make this right. But she can't. She's far too damaged for that. Maybe they both are. And even if they weren't, she knows it's going to take a lot more than a few weeks at the beach before she's able to look Lexa in the eyes without wondering whether she's about to feel a metaphorical knife jammed between her shoulder blades.

"And yours is still weak," Clarke says softly.

She doesn't mean weakness, not really. What she means is love. Because as much as Lexa tries to hide it, Clarke knows she has a heart. Lexa's eyes squeeze shut, but not before Clarke sees the deep pain hiding in them. She understood what Clarke truly meant. And the guilt of it all is threatening to drown her.

Part of Clarke wants to stay and hash this out, but another part of her doesn't dare. If she stays, she'll only get sucked back in. And she's not ready for that. Not by a mile. So instead she takes advantage of Lexa's temporary obscured vision by disappearing back into the tree line. Once she's safely out of sight, she points herself east and starts walking.

She doesn't dare look back.

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Life at the beach continues in its pattern despite the frigid temperatures. Talia and Manon still visit every few days. Clarke soon gets to be a pretty fair shot with the knife. Her skill with a sword is also improving, although she's not a master by any stretch. According to Manon, all she could really do is buy herself enough time to run away. But for all his bluntness, Clarke has a feeling she's growing on him. Talia seems to think Clarke fell from heaven. She tells Clarke all about life in the village and how she's training to be a warrior. The other seconds have stopped teasing her the way they once did, and the grateful looks Manon gives Clarke make it clear that it's these practice sessions that are helping his sister's skills improve so rapidly.

Somehow the subject of chess comes up during an early visit, at which point Clarke discovers that neither of the siblings has ever heard of the game. She immediately decides to fix that. She picks up thirty-two stones from the woods and paints black and white symbols on them for each type of piece. Then she draws a chess board on a piece of paper. The next time the siblings visit, Clarke teaches them how to play. Talia sees it purely as a game, giving little thought to her moves but still enjoying herself thoroughly. Manon, on the other hand, proves to be something of a strategic genius. It only takes a handful of games before he starts giving Clarke a run for her money.

Now whenever they finish sparring, they retreat into Clarke's cave. She and Talia play a game or two while Manon sits in the corner and carves pieces of wood with his knife. Then he takes a turn playing against Clarke. Their games are far longer and far more serious. Sometimes Talia sits and watches in rare silence, and sometimes she instead amuses herself by reverently looking through Clarke's sketchpads. The constant death that fills them seems not to bother her at all. Sometimes she asks about their subjects and Clarke will explain. It's hard to talk about them at first, but as time goes by, Clarke begins to open up a little more about her drawings. When she talks about them, Talia sits in respectful silence and listens with wide eyes. Even Manon appears to halt his strategic planning to listen. In fact, talking about exactly what she has lost seems to further thaw Manon's serious nature.

"You speak for the dead," he says one day when Clarke has finished answering Talia.

"What?" Clarke asks, unsure if she heard correctly.

"There is an old man in our village," Manon explains. "He remembers the faces of all those we have lost in his life. He can tell their stories if asked. We say he speaks for the dead."

Clarke doesn't really know what to say to that. It sounds almost like a compliment, but if it is, she doesn't want it. Thankfully, she's saved by Talia jumping to her feet.

"Listen!" Talia cries excitedly.

Clarke and Manon both strain to hear. Clarke can just make out the sound of something light repeatedly hitting a surface. Talia is out of the cave in a flash. Manon gets up to follow her, and so does Clarke.

"Snow!" Talia yells.

When Clarke steps out of the cave, she's shocked to see that it is indeed snowing. There are large white flakes falling from the sky. They land on her face like cold kisses. It's the first time Clarke has ever seen snow. She looks up at the sky in wonder as the flakes continue to fall around her. Talia is laughing and spinning in circles with her arms outstretched. Manon is watching his sister with something close to a smile.

"It's beautiful," Clarke whispers.

"You have never seen it?" Manon asks in surprise. Clarke shakes her head.

"Come on!" Talia cries. She catches Clarke's hand and drags her further out onto the beach where she proceeds to spin around, pulling Clarke in a circle with her.

Together they revel in the falling flakes. The stuff piles up quickly on the beach, and before long there's a solid layer of white that shows all of their footprints. Talia is beside herself with joy as she dances and laughs. Clarke can't contain her own smile at the beauty the beach has become.

And then a lump of snow splats against her neck. Clarke yelps in shock as the wet stuff begins to leak down her neck into her sweater. She tries to wipe it off as the sound of Talia's glee fills her ears. Clarke turns around to see that Talia is doubled over laughing.

"Oh, you are dead," Clarke tells her.

She bends down and scoops up her own handful of the frigid slush. Talia shrieks and takes off running down the beach. Clarke immediately gives chase. She's faster than Talia, and it takes very little time to close the gap. She launches the ball of snow through the air. Talia tries to look behind her and ends up stumbling, crashing down into the snow. The ball of snow sails right over her head and crashes into Manon's face.

Clarke staggers to a halt as she waits to see what he'll do. Talia too looks up from the snowy ground with baited breath. So far, Manon has been content to simply stand by and watch the other two play in the snow. Now he wipes the snow from his face, shaking some out of his hair in the process. He looks at Clarke through snow-crusted eyelashes, and for a moment there is dead silence on the beach.

Then a grin creeps across Manon's face. That's a bit surprising. But the biggest shock comes when he opens his mouth and laughs. It's a strange barking noise as if his throat has forgotten how to make the sound. But there's no doubt that it is indeed a laugh. Clarke is shocked. She's never heard him laugh before.

Talia collapses into the snow as she dissolves into laughter too. Clarke finds herself following suit. Laughter bubbles up within her, and then the sound is escaping to blend with Manon and Talia's laughter. It's the first time Clarke has laughed since... Actually, she can't even remember the last time she laughed. From the look on Manon's face, it seems he can't remember the last time he did either.

"I think it is you who are dead," he says dangerously.

Clarke doesn't even wait for him to pick up a handful of snow. She just turns and takes off down the beach. Talia is close behind her. As she hightails it through the snow, it occurs to Clarke that in this moment, she actually feels happy. And for the first time since Mount Weather, her being happy doesn't feel like a complete betrayal of the dead.

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Snow comes and goes from the beach as winter runs its course. Some mornings there's even ice on the beach when Clarke goes running. She's taken to wearing multiple layers to keep herself warm, and her black gloves have become a constant fixture on her hands. She also lines her boots with rabbit skins to keep her feet warm. Manon seems mildly impressed that she figured that out on her own. As the temperature drops, his disposition seems to warm. He's still a serious boy, but now he smiles occasionally and he no longer finds fault with everything Clarke does. He reminds her of Wells with his quiet nature. It's comforting, really.

Clarke keeps drawing as well. She does it mostly at night now, steadily filling up another sketchpad and then another. The habit has become so natural that it actually takes her all of a week to realize that she's stopped drawing only death and destruction. Instead, a handful of her drawings have begun to capture other moments. Finn floating in the drop ship, Jasper across the river with his hands proudly in the air, Miles and his hopeful smile as he acted on his painfully obvious crush. The pain in Clarke's chest is still there, but she can look at some of these lighter drawings now with a little more nostalgia than sadness.

The nightmares still come often, but it's not every night anymore and Clarke no longer wakes up screaming or crying every time. About half the time she actually manages to sleep soundly until sunrise. It's progress. Slow progress, but progress. Maybe she really can shake the ghosts after all.

That brief hope is quickly dashed to pieces. Talia and Manon are visiting on the warmest day in weeks, so they and Clarke have decided to move their chess games outside for the first time. Clarke has her hood up against the cold air, and she still has to occasionally blow on her fingers sticking out of her fingerless gloves to warm them up. But at least they aren't threatening to lose feeling as she waits for Manon to make his move. The paper chessboard sits between them on a piece of wood. Talia is sitting nearby looking through yet another sketchpad.

"What is this?" she asks, holding up the book.

Clarke looks up and her heart catches in her throat. The picture Talia has chosen is a drawing of the crater at Tondc. There are flames licking the rubble and people trying to pull others from the mess. It's not a particularly graphic image, but aside from Mount Weather, Tondc is what troubles Clarke's sleep the most.

"It is Tondc," Manon says as he quietly moves his bishop. Clarke looks at him in surprise.

"You know it?" she asks.

"I went there with the other warriors and seconds from our village," he says without looking up. His arm has been out of its sling for a couple weeks, but he unconsciously touches the healed bones as he talks. "We were there when the missile hit. That is where I was injured."

"He almost died," Talia says. "Our father saved him."

"But he could not save our mother," Manon adds quietly.

Just like that, Clarke's blood turns to ice. Their mother was in Tondc. And she died there because of what Clarke did. The pain in Talia's eyes the first day she came to the beach... That pain was Clarke's fault. She killed their mother. And she nearly killed Manon too.

"I'm sorry," she whispers.

"It was hard," Talia says, assuming Clarke is simply being polite. "I miss her."

Manon's face, however, is suddenly unreadable

"The Mountain Men have paid for their deeds," he says simply. Clarke can't tell if he's saying that for her benefit or Talia's. "Their fight is ended just as hers is."

"How did you survive the missile?" Talia asks curiously. It's an innocent question, but it nearly breaks Clarke.

"She was one of the lucky ones," Manon says before she can answer.

Then he looks up and Clarke's heart stops. Because there is a quiet knowledge in his gaze as he stares back at her. Clarke realizes with horror that he knows. He knows she knew about the missile. Suddenly it all makes sense. His seeming hostility that first day, the fact that it's taken so long for him to warm up, the weighing looks he gives her when he thinks she doesn't see. This whole time he's known what she did. He's known she killed his mother.

It's clear that Talia has no idea, but that doesn't make it any easier to bear.

"We should go," Manon says to Talia. "Father will worry."

Talia sighs and gives Clarke the sketchpad while Manon puts the chess stones into a leather bag he made for them. Then they're both gone, leaving Clarke alone on the beach. She sits there for a long time. She had no idea their mother had been in Tondc. That's bad enough. But for Manon to know what she's done...

She gets up and walks down the beach until her feet are just barely outside the reach of the choppy waves. There are dark clouds gathering in the sky. It's going to rain soon. A flash of lightning cuts across the horizon, followed by the crash of thunder. The loud noise finally snaps something inside of Clarke. She opens her mouth and yells at the sea until she's hoarse, releasing all of her anger and pain to whatever higher power might be listening. But the only answer she receives is more thunder drowning out the sound of her shouting.

When she finally stops screaming, there are two tear stains running down her cheeks.

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A full week and a half passes with no sign of Manon and Talia. Clarke starts to wonder if they'll come back at all. She sticks to her same routine. Run, hunt, chop wood, draw, sleep, repeat. The beach is no longer completely freezing, so she spends more and more time out of her cave. But it feels painfully lonely without the Grounder siblings to keep her company.

She's sitting on the cold sand one morning staring at the frigid waves when she hears footsteps behind her. Clarke looks over her shoulder to see a fully grown Grounder man coming towards her. She's on her feet in a second, gun out and pointed at him.

"Who are you?" she demands.

The man stops walking and holds up his hands in a nonthreatening gesture.

"My name is Ronan," he says. "Manon and Talia are my children."

Clarke lowers her gun, but she keeps her pointer finger right above the trigger.

"What do you want?" she asks suspiciously.

"I mean you no harm, Clarke of the Sky People," Ronan says. "I wish only to speak with you." He points at the sand. "May I sit?"

Clarke hesitates briefly. He has a sword and he's clearly been trained as a warrior. But he chose to alert her to his presence instead of sneaking up on her like he probably could have. Finally she nods and holsters her gun. Ronan walks over to her and lowers himself onto the sand. Clarke carefully does the same.

"This is a beautiful place," Ronan says as he looks out at the waves. "I will miss it."

"Are you leaving?" Clarke asks in confusion.

"When the world is warm again, I will take my children across the sea to the Boat People," Ronan says. He looks over at Clarke. "The coalition is breaking. The clans will soon be at war. Luna, the leader of the Boat People, has made it clear that she will have no part in the fighting. My family will be safer there. She is kind to strangers and will accept us into her clan."

Clarke looks out over the sea as that sinks in. If Manon and Talia leave, she'll be alone on the beach again. The idea had sounded pleasant when she first arrived, but now she's not so sure. Then again, maybe being alone is exactly what she deserves.

"My children will miss you when we leave," Ronan says to her. "You mean a great deal to them."

"I shouldn't," Clarke says softly.

"Because you knew about the missile," Ronan says. Clarke's head jerks up. Ronan just shrugs at her expression. "Many of our warriors have guessed the truth. It is not difficult."

Clarks looks down at her knees, which are pulled up almost to her chest.

"If Talia knew, she would never forgive me," Clarke says quietly. "I wouldn't blame her. And Manon..."

"He understands," Ronan says. Clarke looks up in surprise. "It is true that he hated you at first. He only came to see that you did not hurt Talia. But you made her smile again. You helped make her a better second. And for that, my son respects you greatly."

"I killed his mother," Clarke says with an angry shake of her head.

"You allowed her to die," Ronan says. "There is a difference."

"It's still my fault," Clarke says, unable to meet his eyes.

"When the missile fell on Tondc," Ronan says quietly, "my son was trapped in the ground with the warrior who was teaching him. I dug to them both, but they were unconscious. The rock above them was unstable and about to fall. I knew I had only time to pull one of them out. The man with my son was the father of three children. Children who would go hungry without him. But I chose to leave him there and save my son instead. I allowed that man to die. Does that make me a bad man?"

"No," Clarke says, shaking her head. "You're a father. You had to choose your son."

"And you are a leader," Ronan responds. "You must always choose your people, no matter the cost."

He has a point. She made the only choice she could have. Clarke's known that for awhile, but somehow it seems to sink in more in light of what Ronan has just told her.

"My son tells me you draw the dead," Ronan says. "Why?"

"I don't know," Clarke says quietly. "I guess I keep hoping it'll bring me peace. But no matter what I do, the ghosts keep coming back."

"They will continue to do so until you let them go," Ronan says.

"How?" Clarke asks. "An entire civilization is gone because of what I did. What right do I have to decide that my people are more deserving of life than someone else's?"

"Would your people have done as the Mountain Men?" Ronan asks. "Would they have drained others of blood to remain alive?"

"No," Clarke says without hesitation. Even when there was no other way, her people had still objected to the idea of murdering all of Mount Weather's residents. They never would've consented to harvesting other people for blood or bone marrow.

"Then they are the better people," Ronan says as if that settles it. "They are the ones who deserve life."

"Maybe they do," Clarke says quietly. "But I killed three hundred and forty-one people to save them. How does that make me any different from the Mountain Men?"

"If the leader of the Mountain Men were in your place," Ronan says. "If he had killed your people, would they haunt him as his people haunt you?"

"No," Clarke says. They would've haunted Dante. They did haunt him, actually. But not Cage. Cage pretended to care about his people, but at the end of the day, it was only his own life that really mattered to him.

"Then you are the better person," Ronan tells her seriously. Clarke shakes her head and looks away, but Ronan keeps speaking. "If the dead haunt you, it means you understand the value of the life you have taken. And only those who understand what they have done can truly seek forgiveness. But the dead cannot give you forgiveness. Only the living. If you would have peace with the dead, then you must first make it with yourself."

"I don't know how," Clarke whispers.

In answer, Ronan turns and looks out at the sea.

"My wife liked to walk this beach," he says. "She would collect items she found here. Her favorite was the glass. It is tossed and marked by the sea. But when it emerges, it is even more beautiful." He turns to look at Clarke, who's watching him in silence as she tries to understand where he's going with this. "You are that glass. You cannot change the scratches you are given. You can only accept them and move on. If you can do this, you may even find that you are better than what you were."

Clarke looks back out at the sea as she thinks that over.

"Do you really believe that?" she asks.

"I believe what I see," Ronan tells her with a shrug. "And I do not see a killer in you, Clarke of the Sky People. I see a great leader who loves her people as a father loves his child. I see a healer who mended the broken hearts of my children. Whatever debt you think you owe my family has been paid. There is nothing for me to forgive."

Clarke's vision has started blurring past the point of visibility. She reaches up and wipes her damp eyes as she lets out a shaky breath.

"Thank you," she whispers. She can barely get the words out amid the sudden tightness of her throat.

"I must return to my village," Ronan says. He pushes himself up off the sand and to his feet. Then he looks back down at Clarke. "You must find a way to forgive yourself. Only then will you be free."

The sound of his footsteps on the sand tells Clarke that he's leaving. She continues to stare out at the waves flowing gently back and forth. Only once she's sure that Ronan is gone does she allow herself to bury her face in her hands. For the first time in a while, Clarke cries hard. But this time it's different. This time the tears are not of pain but relief. In spite of all her efforts, there has been a lingering part of her that wasn't sure she deserved forgiveness. But now she's beginning to wonder if maybe, just maybe, she can still be saved.

The gift Ronan gave her today was not his wisdom or even his forgiveness. No, he gave her something far more precious. He gave her hope.

* * *

Hopefully you enjoyed this chapter. Either way, please take a second to leave a review. I would be extremely grateful for the feedback. If you want to see Lexa's point of view on her run-in with Clarke, feel free to check out my one-shot "This Is Life Without You," which examines the various stages of Lexa trying to cope with her betrayal of Clarke as the coalition slowly comes apart. As for this story, the next chapter will be posted sometime in the next few days. It will have far less of the OCs, for those of you who don't really care for them. Instead, the other characters from the show will begin making appearances, including both of the Blake siblings. So keep an eye out for that. Thanks for reading!


	3. Spring

Disclaimer: I own nothing.

Author's Note: I'm amazed at the feedback this story has gotten. Thank you to everyone who reviewed, favorited, or followed it. You guys are amazing. This brings us to chapter three. I don't want to spoil anything, although if you read the song lyrics you can probably figure out something big that happens at the end of this chapter. And while you're at it, listen to "Home II" by Dotan because it's such a beautiful song. And in my opinion, it makes a great soundtrack for the last quarter of this chapter. Enjoy!

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**Spring**

Talia and Manon return to the beach a few days later. It turns out they were kept away by their duties as seconds and not out of any actual malice. Talia shows no sign that she realizes anything has changed. Manon, however, catches Clarke's eye and gives her a small but meaningful nod. He may not have completely forgiven her, but somehow he still understands. And that means more to Clarke than she can ever say.

The beach begins to warm again as winter draws to a close. Hints of spring start appearing here and there. The sea water begins to get warmer as well, although it's still frigid most days. The sun is out for longer and longer periods. Spots of green begin showing up in the forest, and it begins to get easier to find game when Clarke goes hunting. The world is being reborn. And part of Clarke has begun to dare to hope that maybe she'll be reborn with it.

Her fighting prowess has definitely changed. She can hit her target with a knife more than half of the time now. Her sword skills are picking up as well. She and Talia are evenly matched, which might be insulting if it weren't for the fact that Manon seems genuinely impressed with his sister's level of skill. He now deems Clarke capable of sparring with him as well, and while he still wins every time, Clarke definitely makes him work for it.

Time seems to slowly be healing her mind as well. She can actually stand to look at some of her darker drawings now without immediately drowning in a flood of emotion. She still creates new ones fairly often, but the subject of her art is steadily evolving. The images she draws now are a mixture of good as well as bad. Because for all its hardship, there have still been some good moments that came from living on the ground.

It takes her a while to notice that she's not just drawing at random. She's begun to draw everything from the pleasant to the painful. Instead of just drawing her guilt, she's now drawing truth. She's drawing what has happened since she came to the ground. And it's no longer just her story. It's the story of all of them. The story of the hundred.

It's a few days after this realization as she's sitting on the beach sketching out Monty proudly hefting a jug of moonshine that a piece of Camp Jaha finally finds her sanctuary.

"Clarke?" a familiar voice calls excitedly.

Clarke looks up from her sketchpad and her jaw nearly hits the sand. Talia is coming toward her, but it wasn't she who spoke. A step behind her is an older girl wearing typical Grounder clothing. But her bright smile is one Clarke would know anywhere.

"Octavia?" Clarke gasps.

Octavia laughs and begins to run down the beach. Clarke quickly stands to her feet, dropping the sketchpad to the sand. A second later Octavia is crashing into her. Then they're both hugging each other as if they'll never let go.

"You have no idea how good it is to see you," Octavia says warmly. She gives Clarke a tight squeeze before pulling away with a wide smile on her face. "I've missed you."

"I missed you too," Clarke says honestly. "How did you find me?"

"I had some help," Octavia says. She glances over her shoulder at Talia, who has stopped a few feet away.

"I know you did not wish to be found," Talia tells Clarke nervously. "But I knew her from your drawings, and she seemed kind."

"You did the right thing," Clarke assures her with a smile. "Thank you."

Talia smiles proudly.

"I will leave you to talk," she says. She turns around and heads back up the beach with something that looks suspiciously like a skip.

"She almost seems too happy to be a Grounder," Octavia says with a shake of her head.

"You should see her with a sword," Clarke says, chuckling. "She's deadly."

Octavia smiles and takes a look around the beach.

"So this is where you've been hiding out, huh?" she says approvingly. "It's nice."

"It really is," Clarke agrees. "So I get that Talia told you where I was. But how did you find her?"

"There's all kinds of stories going around the Woods Clan about Clarke of the Sky People," Octavia says. "You're a legend. The girl who destroyed the Mountain. Then about a week ago rumors starting popping up about a blonde girl living by the sea. Your mom wanted someone to come out here and take a look, so I volunteered. I figured if I found you, then if you didn't want to be found, I could pretend you weren't."

"You'd do that?" Clarke asks curiously. Octavia shrugs.

"Indra told Lincoln and I that she sent you out here," she admits. "Something about making peace with the dead. She said you might not be ready yet. And I get it. What you did at Mount Weather... It had to be done, Clarke. But I get if you can't live with that. I couldn't live with it for a while, and I'm not even the one who did it. So if you need space, I get it. But when you're done, you gotta know that you have a place to come back to."

"I can't yet," Clarke says honestly. She glances out at the sea and bites her lip briefly before returning her gaze to Octavia. "But maybe someday."

"I can live with that," Octavia says. Clarke gives her a grateful smile. Octavia smiles back and then turns to face the water. "Now if you don't mind, I'd like to check out this sea thing. 'Cause that's the real reason I walked three days out here."

Clarke can't help chuckling at that. She really has missed Octavia.

"Come on," Octavia says, pulling off her jacket and smiling mischievously. "Last one in smells like Monty's moonshine."

"Oh, you're on," Clarke says as she yanks off her boots.

She ends up losing by a matter of seconds, but it hardly matters. They spend a long time in the water, laughing and picking up shells and splashing each other until they're both drenched. Once they're finally finished, they dry themselves off and get dressed. Then they sit down on the beach to talk.

Octavia tells Clarke all about Camp Jaha. Everyone is doing well, it seems. Bellamy has stepped up to become something of a leader. Abby and Kane both listen to his ideas, and he's even in charge of the guard. He misses Clarke a lot, and Octavia says his eyes still drift towards the gate like he's waiting for her to come home. But he's doing a solid job taking care of their people just like she asked him too.

Raven and Wick are officially dating now. They spend most of their time in Raven's work room rigging up new projects. Monty has started up the still again, and somehow he's managed to keep it hidden from both Kane and Abby. He and Harper are dating too. No real surprise there. Kane and Abby also seem to be developing something more than friendship, although no one has managed to catch them kissing yet. Though not for lack of trying on Raven's part. Abby misses her daughter, but Octavia seems confident that Clarke would be proud of what her mom has done for Camp Jaha.

Interestingly enough, Abby has allowed the remaining members of the hundred to set up their own community of sorts just outside of Camp Jaha. Apparently the fact that they survived so much by themselves has earned them the right to be treated as quasi adults. The community is mostly just a small tent city with a wall, but they more or less provide for themselves, although they all still hold jobs within the main camp and agree to follow its laws. With the exception of Monty's still, which they all seem to have unanimously agreed not to sell out. They appear to be recovering well. There's a lot of laughter now and even games, according to Octavia. She says Jasper is still fairly quiet and he makes a lot of trips to Mount Weather to pay his respects to Maya. But he and Monty are on tentative speaking terms now, and he seems to be slowly moving back toward the adventurous prankster he used to be.

Octavia and Lincoln are the official Ark liaisons with Tondc, which is now neutral territory and which the Arkers have helped to rebuild. The coalition is starting to crumble just as Ronan said. There have already been several smaller battles, and all-out war is expected any day now. But the legend of Clarke's power has caused the Grounders to leave Camp Jaha alone, and the fact that Tondc is the only village the Arkers will associate with seems to have offered it some level of protection as well. So when war does come, there's a good chance they won't have to get involved. And they have Clarke to thank for it. She's still not sure how she feels about that.

When Octavia finally runs out of things to say, Clarke starts telling her about life on the beach. It doesn't take long to summarize, since the only thing that has really happened other than her run-in with the bear (which definitely impresses Octavia) has been her time with Talia and Manon. Still, Octavia listens to it all with interest. Once Clarke has said all there is to say, she goes into the cave and gets her stack of sketchpads.

"What is all this?" Octavia asks, opening up the first sketchpad.

"It started out as penance, I guess," Clarke says with a shrug. She stretches her arms out on the sand behind her so she can lean back against them. "But now... Now it's everything. It's our story. Every part of it. The good and the bad."

"Clarke, this is amazing," Octavia says as she turns through the pages.

The two of them sit in silence as Octavia slowly flips through each sketchbook, quietly drinking in the emotion of each drawing. Some make her smile while others make her sigh heavily. Clarke just stares out at the waves and waits.

Finally Octavia closes the final sketchbook. She continues to sit there in silence for a moment, almost as if she doesn't want to break the peaceful moment.

"These are incredible," she says finally.

"They're not quite finished yet," Clarke tells her. "There's still a few more things I haven't drawn."

"And then what?" Octavia asks, looking over at her friend. "What are you gonna do once you finish?"

"I don't know," Clarke admits with a shrug. Octavia nods and looks back out at the sea.

"You should come back," she says firmly. She risks a glance at Clarke, almost as if she's unsure of whether she's pushing too far.

"I'll think about it," Clarke says finally. "I promise."

Octavia seems to know that's the best she'll get, because she nods and looks back out at the sea. But she still looks just the tiniest bit disappointed. Clarke reaches across the sand and puts her hand on top of Octavia's.

"It really is good to see you," she says honestly.

Octavia turns her hand over in the sand so she can hold Clarke's tightly in her own.

"You too," she says with a warm smile.

They fall silent again as the sun begins to set. Neither of them says a word as they watch the great fireball paint the sky and sea with vibrant strokes of color. They don't have to speak. They're here together, and for right now, that's more than enough.

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The beach continues to get warmer with every passing day. Clarke starts running barefoot again with her sleeves pushed up to her elbows. Her knife proficiency increases to roughly nine successful throws out of ten. She even manages to knock Manon on his back a few times during their sword sessions, which amuses Talia to no end. But as the sun gains strength and the woods explode with green, Clarke knows in the back of her mind that her time with the siblings is slowly coming to an end.

And then the day arrives when Talia and Manon show up at the beach with their father in tow. It only takes one look at Talia's sad eyes to know that this is going to be good-bye.

Talia reaches Clarke first, throwing her arms around Clarke's waist and pressing her face into Clarke's jacket. Clarke hugs Talia back tightly. Manon and his father hang back a few steps to give them a moment.

When Talia finally pulls away, her eyes are red and damp.

"I do not want to leave," she says.

"Hey," Clarke says, putting her hands on Talia's shoulders. She puts on the best smile she can muster. "I know this is hard, but the people of the Boat Clan are good people. You'll be safer there. And someday you're going to be a great warrior for them."

Talia forces a nod, but she's clearly close to tears. Clarke takes the pouch of chess stones out of her pocket and hands it to Talia.

"Here," she says as she closes Talia's hand around the bag. "Have Manon make you a board out of wood. Then you can teach the other seconds how to play."

"I will beat them all," Talia says. She's grinning a little now at the prospect.

"I'm sure you will," Clarke says with a smile.

"What about you?" Talia asks in a more serious tone. "Will I see you again?"

"I don't know," Clarke says. "I hope so."

"I do too," Talia says.

"Among my people, when we say good-bye, we have a special phrase," Clarke says. "We say, 'May we meet again.'"

"May we meet again," Talia says carefully, making sure she has each word right.

"Exactly," Clarke says. "May we meet again, Talia."

"May we meet again, Clarke," Talia says solemnly. She leans forward and wraps her arms tightly around Clarke's waist again. Clarke smiles and hugs her back. Finally Talia pulls away and goes to stand beside her father, who places a comforting hand on her shoulder.

Manon comes next. He walks over with the same serious expression as always.

"You know, we have another phrase among the Sky People," Clarke tells him with a grin. "Lighten up."

"What does that mean?" Manon asks in confusion.

"It means smile more," Clarke says. "Enjoy life. You never know how long you have."

"That sounds like a good phrase," Manon says with the barest hint of a smile.

He holds out his hand and opens it to reveal a piece of blue glass. It's covered in tiny pock marks that make it appear almost frosted.

"My mother would pick up glass like this from the beach," he says. "She said it shows that some things are only made more beautiful by trials. She would want you to have this."

"Are you sure?" Clarke asks softly. They both know his mother is dead because of her actions. But Manon nods in confirmation.

"She would have liked you," he says with a shrug. "And I have other pieces."

Clarke slowly reaches out her hand and very carefully takes the piece of glass. The gift may be small, but its meaning is overwhelming. Manon truly does forgive her for what happened in Tondc.

"Thank-you," she says sincerely.

Manon holds out his right arm in the Grounder fashion. Clarke does the same, and they clasp forearms like equals.

"May we meet again," he says.

"May we meet again," Clarke responds.

The farewell is a strange joining of cultures, but it seems appropriate.

"Take care of your sister," Clarke says as they release forearms. "And yourself."

"I will," Manon assures her. "And I will try to 'lighten up.'" There's a hint of a smile on his face as he says it. Clarke grins back. "You take care of yourself as well."

"I will," she promises.

Manon gives her a nod and then goes to stand beside Talia. Ronan approaches Clarke last. He glances over his shoulder at Manon and Talia, and then turns back to Clarke.

"Thank you for what you have done for my children," he says.

"They're the ones who helped me," Clarke says honestly.

"We have told no one that they visit you," Ronan says. "The rest of our village will stay away. You will have no visitors unless you wish it."

"Thank you," Clarke says. It means a lot that he respects her privacy.

Ronan holds out his arm in the same way Manon did, and Clarke takes it.

"Farewell, Clarke of the Sky People," he says. "I hope you find what you are looking for."

"You too," Clarke says. "Good luck."

Ronan gives her a nod. Then they release forearms and he turns toward his family. Together the three of them start making their way up the beach. Talia look over her shoulder a few times as they go. Clarke smiles bravely and waves at her, to which Talia smiles back. Then the family is disappearing into the trees, leaving Clarke alone on the beach.

She turns around to face the sea as she looks down at the piece of glass in her hand. Her finger runs reverently over the pocked surface. The damage of the sea has made it a thing of beauty. It's a good metaphor, she decides. She can't undo what she's gone through. But maybe there's some beauty hiding somewhere in the damage. Now she just has to find it.

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It feels strange having the beach all to herself with no visitors to look forward to. The days start blurring together now that there's nothing to distinguish them. Clarke still runs on the beach every morning. Some days she swims in the water that's steadily getting warmer. Summer is definitely on the way. She barely uses the cave now except for when it rains. Most nights she even drags her blanket outside and sleeps on the open sand.

The temperature change also means a return of several edible plants and nuts. The animals are coming out more too. One day when Clarke's out hunting, she catches sight of a mother deer and her fawn. After that she sticks more to fishing and trapping. She just doesn't have the heart to separate another child from its mother.

Aside from that incident, however, the guilt has gotten far easier to bear. The nightmares come only rarely now, and when they do, she no longer wakes up screaming and sobbing. It seems the dead have finally forgiven her. Now she just has to figure out how to forgive herself. She understands why she did what she did, and she's finally learning to accept it. But she still can't go back to Camp Jaha. Not yet. She's still not quite ready to face her people. The guilt may be fading here, but seeing those faces just might reawaken it beyond her ability to deal. So instead she stays at the beach, silently waiting for some sign that her penance is complete, that she's finally whole enough to go home.

She keeps drawing. She's sketched almost everything she can remember. The story her work tells is almost complete. Besides, she's about to run out of paper again. Part of Clarke wonders if maybe that's the sign she's been waiting for, but her gut says that she's still not quite healed enough to return. And so she waits.

She's been alone at the beach for about two weeks when Camp Jaha butts in again. Clarke comes back from a hunting trip with a pair of rabbits over her shoulder to see a surprisingly familiar Grounder warrior sitting quietly on the sand.

"Lincoln?" she calls in surprise.

The figure looks up and a smile crosses his face. He quickly stands to his feet. Clarke drops the rabbit and hurries forward the last few steps to wrap her arms around his neck. Lincoln hugs her back with a fond chuckle.

"What are you doing here?" Clarke asks as she pulls away. In answer, Lincoln bends down to pick up a rucksack, which he holds out to Clarke. She gives him a curious look as she opens the bag. Inside are two sketchpads.

"More paper," Lincoln says. "Octavia thought you might be running out."

"Thank you," Clarke says. She's touched by the gesture. "Where is Octavia?"

"She wanted to come, but she's busy with Indra," Lincoln tells her. "And if we were both gone this long, your mother would ask questions."

"Octavia didn't tell her?" Clarke asks. Lincoln shakes his head.

"She told you she wouldn't," he points out. "Indra guessed that Octavia had found you, but she won't tell anyone."

"How is everyone?" Clarke asks.

"They're good," Lincoln says. "They're ready for you to come home."

"Not yet," Clarke says. She glances down at the rucksack and then up at Lincoln. "But maybe soon."

Lincoln nods in acceptance. It means the world to Clarke that he doesn't press.

"I should go," he says. "It's a long journey back."

Part of Clarke wants to ask him to stay, but another part of her is glad he's respecting her self-imposed exile. She reaches up to give him another tight hug, which Lincoln returns.

"Tell Octavia I said hello," Clarke says.

"I will," Lincoln tells her. They separate, and he looks her straight in the eyes. "When you're ready, you know where to find us."

Clarke doesn't know what to say to that, so instead she just nods. Lincoln starts up the beach, and a minute later he's gone. Part of Clarke almost turns and heads after him. But she knows she's not ready. The dead may have stopped haunting her here, but now it's the living she can't face. They all know what she did. And some of them may understand it, but not all of them will. Clarke needs more time. She needs to be absolutely sure that she's ready.

She skins the rabbits and sets them cooking over a fire on the beach. Then she turns to drawing while she waits. There's only one page left in her old sketchpad. She uses it up, stopping in the middle to eat her late lunch before finishing the picture. Then she reaches into the rucksack Lincoln left her. One of the sketchpads is about twice as thick as the other. She pulls that one out first and flips it open, pencil in hand. What she sees surprises her.

The page isn't blank. There's a drawing on it. It's a picture of Clarke with a map looking off into the distance. The outline of the drop ship is visible behind her. It's that first day on the ground. Clarke stares down at the drawing in surprise. She recognizes the style. It's one of Lincoln's drawings. But he wasn't there that day. Someone must have told him about it.

She turns the page and sees another drawing of herself. This one is of her and Finn standing on a rock laughing. There's a vine in Finn's hand. Clarke recognizes it as the moment right after Jasper had swung across the river before the spear ended up in his chest. In spite of the events that came after, she feels a hint of a smile pulling at her mouth.

A quick flip of the pages shows that the rest of the sketchpad is filled with pictures as well. Curious, Clarke begins to slowly thumb through them one at a time. They're all various drawings of her. Sitting next to Charlotte after her nightmare. (She has to wonder who saw that.) Smiling brightly as she looks into what she can only assume is Raven's escape pod. Healing various cuts and bruises. Laughing at one of Monty's stupid jokes. Holding out her hand to Anya on the bridge. Balancing the chip on her nose while trying to play a drinking game she was admittedly horrible at. Standing beside Bellamy with each of them holding a bag of guns. Reuniting with the forty-eight after getting out of Mount Weather's quarantine. Pointing a gun off the page while wearing a hood. (The phrase "You are my people" is scrawled beneath the picture. It's the only drawing with words.) And on and on and on.

All together, the pictures seem to tell the story of Clarke. So many of them capture moments Lincoln never saw, meaning he had help from the remaining members of the hundred. But none of the pictures show the bloody angel of death Clarke expects Camp Jaha to see her as. Instead, they show a young woman who is strong and brave and caring and has a beautiful smile. By the time Clarke gets to the end of the sketchpad, she's openly crying. Is this really how they see her?

The last page shows a drawing of Clarke and Abby hugging one another. There's a loose piece of paper pressed between the drawing and the previous page. Clarke pulls it out and unfolds it. It's a short note written in her mother's familiar looping handwriting.

_I love you so much, Clarke. Please come home. –Mom_

It's too much. Clarke puts her head in her hands and weeps. She's not even sure why she's crying now. If it's sadness for the pieces of herself that she's lost or gratitude that the people she cares about love her in spite of what she's done. But either way, whatever it is she's been waiting for, this book is it.

Finally she runs out of tears. She lifts her head from her hands, wiping away the watery tracks covering her cheeks. Then she reaches into the pocket of her jacket and pulls out the piece of glass Manon gave her. The sight of it makes her smile despite her watery vision. She's finally found it. The beauty in the scratched glass. Turns out it was there all along.

She closes her hand around the glass and looks up at the calm sea spread out before her. For the first time since coming to the beach, she finally feels like she can see the end of this tunnel, like she can actually picture herself returning to Camp Jaha. Part of her had started to wonder if she would ever go back at all, but now she knows she will. Maybe not quite yet. There's still a few things she needs to draw before this healing process is finally finished. But she suddenly knows with absolutely certainty that she will be going home when this is over.

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The season of the sun is definitely on its way. The beach is steadily getting warmer. Clarke still runs in the mornings, but now she usually ends up in the water afterwards to cool herself down. She splits the rest of her time between hunting and drawing. She's almost finished now. The empty sketchbook from Lincoln is quickly filling up. Most of her drawings now are of her time at the beach. She sketches Talia laughing, Manon playing chess, the sun setting over the sea. And as she draws, she realizes that her shattered heart is finally putting itself back together. The scars are still there, as she's pretty sure they always will be. But the wounds are no longer open and bleeding. They're healing. And slowly but surely, so is Clarke.

Soon there are only two pages left in the sketchpad. As she sits on the beach one evening trying to decide what to fill them with, she idly flips up the second to last page. She's surprised to see writing on the final page of the sketchpad. It's in the middle of the page, which is why she didn't catch it the other times she's flipped through. The message is written in a tilted scrawl that Clarke recognizes from all her time spent planning the assault in front of the drawing board in Raven's workroom.

_Alright, princess. You've sulked long enough. Now get your butt back here. -Raven_

Underneath it is another line that looks as if it were added as an afterthought.

_P.S. I __will__ come find you and drag you back here if I have to. _

Clarke chuckles as she reads the words. How like Raven to give her a kick in the butt. And truth be told, that's exactly what she needs. She's put this off long enough.

She flips back to the next to last page and begins to draw. By the time the sun gets too low to provide good light, Clarke has finished the last drawing. It's a picture of her hand holding up the piece of frosted glass so the light of the setting sun comes through it. The beach and sea are both visible in the background. Somehow that one image seems to perfectly capture her entire stay here. Satisfied with her work, Clarke closes the sketchpad and goes to get her blanket. She needs to get a good night's sleep. Because tomorrow she's going home.

X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X

When the sun comes up, it takes Clarke all of five minutes to pack her gear. She wades out into the sea water one final time in her own silent good-bye to her sanctuary. Then she dries off her feet, puts on her shoes, picks up her two packs (one of supplies and one of filled sketchpads), and heads west.

She walks for the whole day, but her feet and her heart feel far lighter than the last time she made this trip. Back then she was doing everything in her power to stay away from the Arkers. But now she's headed straight for Camp Jaha. She's going home. And her mouth keeps twisting itself into an almost-smile as she thinks about it.

Just before sunset, she stops to make camp in the woods. She's been sitting beside her small campfire for a while when she hears a hint of movement in the darkness.

"I know you're there," she says without looking up.

There is a moment of utter silence. And then Indra steps into the firelight. Clarke isn't too surprised to see the chief. Actually, she's sort of been waiting for Indra to show up.

"Were you watching for me?" Clarke asks as Indra kneels beside her fire.

"Lincoln thought you might be returning soon," Indra says. "I told my scouts to keep their eyes open. Are you returning to your people?"

Ever a woman of few words.

"Yes," Clarke says honestly. "I'm going home."

"You were gone longer than I expected," Indra says drily.

"There were a lot of ghosts to make peace with," Clarke says.

"And now?" Indra asks.

"The ghosts are quiet," Clarke says with a hint of a smile. They're not gone yet. Not completely. But she has a feeling they won't be until she faces her people again.

"Good," Indra says. Clarke is surprised to see something that looks like respect flickering in Indra's eyes. If she didn't know any better, she might think Indra was happy to see her.

Indra gets to her feet then, clearly ending their conversation.

"Your people will be happy to see you," she says. The fact that she cares at all about Clarke's reunion with Camp Jaha shocks Clarke so much she almost doesn't manage to respond.

"Indra?" she calls as the chief reaches the edge of the campfire's light. Indra turns back, her eyebrow raised in question. "Thank you."

She's not really sure what she means it to be for. For not judging her that night all those months ago. For suggesting she go to the sea. For helping out Octavia and Lincoln in the meantime. For looking after Lexa as Clarke knows she surely has. For coming out here tonight to check on her. Maybe for all of it. But whatever it is, Indra seems to understand because she gives Clarke a solemn nod. And then she's gone, disappearing into the forest.

Clarke unrolls her blanket and lays down beside the fire. This is the last nigh she'll spend outside like this. Tomorrow she'll be sleeping on a bed with a roof over her head. Tomorrow she'll finally be home.

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It actually ends up being the day after tomorrow. She gets close enough that she could probably reach Camp Jaha before nightfall, but she decides she'd rather wait until morning. She wants to have plenty of time to be reunited with everyone. Plus, her heart has begun to pound so hard it might explode. One more night of mental preparation can't hurt.

She sets off at sunrise the next morning. It takes about an hour before Camp Jaha finally comes into view. Clarke hangs back within the tree line for a moment, silently watching the camp. People are already moving about the yard inside the fence as they begin their day. There's also movement in the tent village beside the larger camp. Clarke's too far away to recognize the faces, but just knowing they're her people warms her heart.

Even so, she hesitates briefly. Is she really ready to do this?

She decides she is.

Taking a deep breath, Clarke steps out of the cover of the trees. It's only a few steps to the main path. Then she's walking down it toward the gate of the camp. Her heart is slamming in her chest. It seems like an eternity since she walked away from this place. She's changed. And she can already see little changes in Camp Jaha even from here. But it still looks like home.

It takes a while before anyone inside the camp notices her. But suddenly there's a shout from inside the gates, and then people are everywhere. She's just close enough to hear someone shouting her name. The shouting gets even louder as familiar faces come spilling out of the small tent village beside the main camp. Soon over forty teenagers are gathered in front of the gate. They all stand there together, waiting for her to reach them. Clarke grins at the sight of them.

Monty is at the front of the pack, but he can't seem to make himself wait. He runs the last few steps and flings his arms around Clarke's neck. The rest of the kids come running after him. Clarke finds herself engulfed in a whirlwind of hugs. Everyone is smiling and laughing as they welcome her back one by one.

Jasper is the last one Clarke gets to. She pauses, and they both stare at each awkwardly.

"I'm glad you're not dead," Jasper says finally. It's not forgiveness, but it's not hostility either. And it's clear from his eyes that he means it. Clarke is more than willing to take that.

"You too," she says sincerely.

"Are you back to stay?" Harper asks, unable to contain herself any longer. The others press in closer as they strain to hear Clarke's answer.

"I'm back," she says.

A round of cheers goes up from the teenagers. Hands reach out to clap Clarke on the back, while others applaud loudly. It amazes Clarke that she's been away from them even longer than she was living with them, and yet they still view her as one of their own.

"Alright, all of you shove over," a snarky voice calls above the noise. The crowd parts with a chuckle as Raven makes her way through. She stops before Clarke with a smug grin. "About time you got back."

"Well, it was this or be dragged," Clarke says, returning the grin. Raven laughs and launches herself at Clarke in a fierce hug. Clarke hugs her back just as tightly.

"It's good to see you," Raven says sincerely.

"You too," Clarke tells her.

"Took you long enough," Octavia's voice says. Raven forces herself to pull away and step to the side as Octavia and Lincoln appear through the crowd. Clarke gives Octavia a warm hug that the other girl immediately returns.

"I wasn't sure you were ever gonna show up," Octavia says as they let go.

"I wasn't either for a while," Clarke admits. "But I had some encouragement." She gives Lincoln a meaningful look. "Thank you for the drawings."

"They all helped," Lincoln says, motioning his head at the crowd of teenagers gathered around them. "They told their stories. I just put them on paper."

"We missed you," Monty tells Clarke. "We wanted you to come home."

"Thank you," Clarke repeats. Everyone nods in acknowledgement, and several eyes are definitely far from dry. Clarke herself is even starting to tear up.

Then suddenly the crowd is parting again to reveal a stunned Abby Griffin standing a few feet away.

"Clarke?" she says softly.

"Mom," Clarke chokes.

Abby's hand flies to her mouth and her eyes fill with tears. It's too much for Clarke. She runs across the short distance into her mother's arms. Abby takes hold of her as if she'll never let go. And to be perfectly honest, Clarke really wouldn't mind that.

"Oh, baby," Abby says through her tears. She keeps alternating between cradling Clarke's head and kissing it as if trying to assure herself that Clarke is really there. "I missed you so much!"

"I missed you too," Clarke says hoarsely.

Abby pulls away and takes Clarke's face in her hands, her eyes scanning Clarke for any sign that she's not okay. She must be satisfied with what she sees, because she gives Clarke a watery smile. Clarke smiles back.

And then she sees Bellamy. He's standing a few steps back, quietly waiting his turn. He looks different. More grown-up. It could be the fact that he's in a guard uniform, but Clarke has a feeling it has more to do with his bearing. He holds himself like a leader now. Not one a group of kids picked haphazardly, but one who has willingly stepped up to the plate.

Abby turns to follow Clarke's gaze. When she sees Bellamy, she steps away from her daughter. Everyone else seems to pull back a step as well as Clarke and Bellamy slowly walk toward each other. They meet in the middle, and Clarke can feel the crowd around them holding its breath.

"Hey, princess," Bellamy says quietly.

"Hey," Clarke says. For a brief second she's afraid this is going to be awkward, but then a fond smile crosses Bellamy's face.

"I knew you'd be back," he says as if he's just won a bet.

"Well, that makes one of us," Clarke says with a light chuckle. Bellamy's gaze flickers to the crowd of teenagers and then back to Clarke.

"I took care of them just like you asked," he says. "Now that you're back, maybe we can take care of them together. It'll be just like old times."

It's like he's spoken the code word Clarke was waiting for. She reaches up and wraps her arms tightly around his neck. Bellamy responds with a hug of his own. He buries his face in her hair, and for a long moment they just stand there holding each other. The crowd gathered around them breaks out into warm smiles. Their two leaders are finally back together. All is now right with the world.

"I'm glad you're back," Bellamy says so quietly no one else can hear.

"Me too," Clarke says.

She tightens her arms briefly before finally forcing herself to pull away. Bellamy smiles down at her, and suddenly it's like she never left.

"How about we go have that drink now?" he says. Clarke grins.

"I'd like that," she says honestly.

Bellamy holds out his hand, and she lets him take one of her rucksacks. Then together they begin walking the rest of the way up the road toward the now-open gate of Camp Jaha. Abby and the teenagers are right behind them. Their princess has finally come home. And her people are welcoming her back with open arms.

* * *

If you liked this chapter, or even if you didn't, please leave a review and let me know your thoughts. It would make me really happy. Thanks again to everyone who reviewed the previous two chapters. So Clarke's home now, but that doesn't mean her journey is ended. There are still a few things she needs to deal with. And it's entirely possible that being back in Camp Jaha could cause a slight resurgence in her PTSD. If you want to know what happens next, you'll have to keep an eye out for the last chapter. I'll probably post it sometime Tuesday. If you want something to read in the meantime, I've written seven other stories for this fandom that you're free to check out. Thanks for reading!


	4. Summer

Disclaimer: I own nothing.

Author's Note: This is the final chapter of this story. When I started posting it, I wasn't sure if I was happy with it, but I was pleasantly surprised at how much interest people showed in it. This chapter ties up a few remaining loose ends and brings this part of Clarke's story to a nice conclusion. By the time it ends, Mount Weather was almost a year ago, so hopefully with that in mind the actions of one character in particular won't seem completely unrealistic. I think that's all that needs saying. Enjoy!

* * *

**Summer**

Clarke expects living in a community again to take some getting used to, but she actually settles back in just fine. She's given a tent of her own in the village of the former delinquents. Octavia subtly makes sure it's next to her tent in case Clarke needs her, Bellamy organizes her some bedding, Raven finds her a fresh sketchpad as a welcome back present, and Abby fusses over Clarke until she's rearranged her meager belongings a hundred times inside the tent. For a few days everybody treats her as something of a celebrity, but finally she starts to settle in.

Meals in the tent village are communal with the designated hunters bringing in food for the whole group. It feels strange not having to do her own hunting anymore. The tent village is mostly empty during the day since everyone has jobs to do in the main camp, but in the evenings it feels like being back at the drop ship. Kids sit around campfires and talk and laugh and play games and drink moonshine from the forbidden still that Abby seems forever unable to locate, although Clarke's pretty sure her mother's meager efforts are all just for show. The former delinquents readily accept Clarke back, drawing her into whatever level of fun is currently occurring. Jasper still says no more to her than absolutely necessary, but he doesn't go out of his way to avoid her either. All in all, the place quickly starts to feel like home.

Nights are a bit more complicated. Being around all of these faces does reopen some of her wounds ever so slightly. The nightmares that had almost completely faded make a bit of a reappearance during her first few weeks back, although they aren't nearly as bad as when she first left. But they must make her thrash in her sleep, because Octavia always seems to know when the nightmares come. When they do, she comes into Clarke's tent and shakes her awake and then beds down beside her for the rest of the night. They don't ever talk about it. They don't have to. Octavia's presence is usually enough for Clarke to drift back off to sleep.

Since all of the delinquents are expected to pull their weight somehow, Clarke gets roped in as a medical assistant in the short-staffed infirmary. There aren't many extreme injuries anymore now that the war is over, so most days the workload is fairly light. But it gives Clarke an excuse to spend some time with her mom when Abby's not busy running the camp. Besides, the work Clarke does as a sort of intern doctor makes her feel useful. And it seems a fitting reversal that she should spend her time now healing instead of killing. She may have mostly accepted what she did at Mount Weather, but some part of her still feels that she needs to make up for it somehow.

That part of her rears its ugly head during her second week back at Camp Jaha. She's in the infirmary with Jackson when Raven comes in. She was working with a piece of machinery and managed to slice her left arm up pretty good. There's no serious damage, but the cut is long and deep and needs several stitches to staunch the flow of blood. That part goes fine. Stitches are old hat for Clarke. And listening to Raven complaining about the damn engineers who built the stupid thing with sharp edges actually makes the process fairly entertaining.

Things don't get ugly until she's finished the job and has dipped a towel in a bucket of water so she can wash Raven's blood off her hands. She looks down at them, and suddenly all she can see is blood. Raven's voice fades from Clarke's awareness as the sight of red becomes overwhelming. Suddenly it's not just Raven's blood. It's the blood of the first deer she killed at the beach. And then it's Finn's and Dante's and Maya's and the rest of the Mountain Men's and then all she can see is red everywhere. Her chest is so tight she can barely breathe. She's scrubbing her hands as hard as she can, but no matter what she does, it won't come off.

She doesn't even hear Raven calling her name until the mechanic's hands are closing around hers. The sudden contact makes her jump as her brain pulls back to reality.

"Clarke, stop!" Raven says frantically.

Only then does she see that most of the blood is off her hands, which she's nearly rubbed raw. She looks up in shock as she realizes she's hyperventilating. Raven takes one look at her face and turns over to where Jackson is examining a man's sore throat.

"Out!" Raven yells. Jackson and the man both look up in surprise. "Now!"

Raven may be small, but the hard tone of her voice makes it very clear that she will hurt them if she has to. The two men quickly make their way to the door, letting the curtain over it fall closed behind them. Clarke takes a step back and sits on the bed Raven was just sitting on as she struggles to catch her breath. It's like her lungs just can't get enough oxygen.

"I'm gonna get Abby," Raven says worriedly.

She turns to leave, but Clarke catches hold of her sleeve.

"Don't leave," she desperately chokes. It takes everything in her just to get the words out. She can feel tears welling in her eyes, but she doesn't care. The last time this happened she was completely alone, and it was terrifying. She doesn't want to go through that again.

Raven looks torn between staying and running for Abby, and for a second Clarke is terrified that she'll go. But then her jaw sets and she sits down on the bed beside Clarke.

"I'm not," Raven says. She takes Clarke's hand in her own, and Clarke immediately holds on for dear life. "I'm right here, okay? But you gotta breathe."

Clarke nods and her other hand clenches around the edge of the bed as her lungs try to get enough oxygen. She feels like she's suffocating. Raven starts running her free hand up and down Clarke's back in an attempt at comfort.

"You're fine," Raven says, fighting to keep her tone even. "Just keep breathing."

It takes Clarke a few minutes to calm herself down. Raven keeps talking to her until the gasping stops, at which point she falls silent while Clarke slowly but surely evens out her breathing. Finally Clarke wipes her eyes, which have begun leaking tears, and looks over at Raven, who is watching her in concern.

"I'm okay," she says weakly.

"You sure?" Raven asks. Clarke nods. "What happened?"

"I don't know," Clarke says. Her throat is hoarse from gasping. She looks down at her free hand, which still shows a faint bloodstain. "There was blood all on my hands and I just..."

She trails off, unable to complete the sentence. But Raven seems to get what she's saying because she gives Clarke's hand a comforting squeeze.

"How often does that happen?" Raven asks quietly. It never ceases to amaze Clarke that the fiery mechanic who takes crap from no one can become so gentle when someone she cares about is hurting.

"It doesn't," Clarke says. Raven gives her a skeptical look, so she elaborates. "It happened once while I was gone. It was... really bad. But since then, I've been fine." Again that skeptical look. "Okay, mostly fine. Sometimes I look at someone and instead of them I see someone from Mount Weather, and then my chest gets tight and it's like I can't breathe. But it never lasts more than a few seconds."

Raven shifts her hand so she can lace her fingers through Clarke's own in a silent display of solidarity.

"Octavia told me you're having nightmares," she says. Her tone makes it almost a question, but her expression makes it clear that she already knows it's true.

Clarke sighs in surrender. Part of her had really hoped Octavia would keep that to herself, but another part isn't surprised that Octavia's concern caused her to reach out to Raven. Come to think of it, she and Raven have both been sticking pretty close to Clarke. Almost like a sort of tag team. Now it makes sense. They're worried. And as much as Clarke wishes she could keep this battle to herself, she's also touched that they care so much.

"Sometimes," she admits. "But they're not as bad as they were. And I barely even have them anymore. I can handle it. I'm fine, Raven. Really."

"You better be," Raven warns. Her tone draws a small chuckle out of Clarke.

Clarke wipes her eyes again and looks back down at her free hand. It's still red, but the color is not from Raven's blood. Clarke has very nearly rubbed it raw. If she had gone on rubbing her hands that hard for much longer, she would've started taking off skin.

"You know, you had me worried for a while there," Raven admits. Clarke looks up, and the seriousness in Raven's eyes tells her the mechanic isn't just talking about the minute or two that Clarke couldn't breathe.

"Sorry," Clarke says softly.

"You came back," Raven says with a shrug. "That's what matters, right?"

Clarke nods. Her eyes are burning again and she has to blink back tears. Raven lets go of Clarke's hand, but then she leans forward and pulls Clarke into a fierce hug. Clarke returns the embrace. Her hands take hold of the fabric of Raven's jacket as she allows her eyes to briefly drift close at the feeling of safety.

"You're gonna be okay," Raven says quietly.

Clarke nods into Raven's shoulder. Raven gives Clarke a tight squeeze before pulling away. Then she straightens her back and slaps her hands on her legs. There's a mischievous gleam in her eyes that warns Clarke she has an idea.

"Alright, enough of this sappy stuff," she says. "I say we go cut loose for a while."

"How?" Clarke asks suspiciously as she wipes her damp eyes.

"Well, I vote we go find Octavia and the three of us can raid Jasper and Monty's still," Raven says with a grin. "We can go bitch about our lives or whatever while we get ourselves good and drunk. And then I say we go do something crazy. Like dancing on tables at the bar. Or skinny dipping in the river."

"The one with the giant eel?" Clarke asks with a grin.

"That one," Raven says. She gives Clarke a devilish smile.

"I don't know," Clarke says hesitantly.

"Come on, princess," Raven says. "You're always the responsible one. Don't you ever want to do something you know you'll regret later? We're young. Let's go act like it."

Clarke smiles and shakes her head.

"Okay," she says, giving in.

"I knew there was a rebel in there somewhere," Raven says triumphantly. "You find Octavia, and I'll get the moonshine. Meet you by the side gate in ten."

She heads out of the infirmary with a grin on her face. Clarke hangs back long enough to clean up from giving Raven stitches. Getting drunk sounds crazy. But maybe that's exactly the point. They are teenagers, after all. They've spent so much of their lives worrying about survival. Now they have a chance to just be kids for a while. Maybe it's time they take it.

As Clarke leaves the infirmary to find Octavia, she knows without a doubt that she's going to regret this in the morning. Strangely, that makes her look forward to it even more.

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Summer has arrived in full force, bringing heat with it. The former delinquents start making regular trips to the river to swim. Clarke goes with them every now and then. It's not quite the sea, but it's a definite relief from the hot sun. And it gives them all a chance to act like crazy teenagers for a while.

When she's not working in the infirmary, Clarke spends her time in a variety of ways. She spars with Lincoln and Octavia on a fairly regular basis. The time she spent working with Talia and Manon means that she can actually hold her own most of the time. She rarely wins, but it feels good to go to bed at night with tired muscles. Plus she loves spending time with Lincoln and Octavia. In spite of everything that's happened, part off Clarke still admires certain aspects of Grounder culture, and being around the two of them lets her hold onto some of that.

Clarke also turns to drawing again. Her sketchpads have gotten passed around the tent village, and the former delinquents have asked her to add to the project. They come to her one by one with stories of moments she never saw. She sketches them out as best she can, and the new drawings are added to the growing collection. She even starts coloring in the older ones with the water colors from Mount Weather.

It's Raven who suggests putting all the pictures together in one book. She and Wick take charge of that half of the project. They rig up a way to glue the pages together and even put together a timeline on one of Raven's boards so they can put Clarke's (and Lincoln's) drawings in chronological order. It's slow going because there turn out to be a lot of other stories the former delinquents want told, but piece by piece the book starts to come together.

Partway through the summer, Clarke starts going with Octavia and Lincoln when they visit Tondc. She's decided it's high time to face the crater and slay that demon for good. The village looks far better than she expects. The Arkers have helped the Grounders to restore almost all of it structurally, and Abby has been helping them improve their medical care as well. The first time Clarke goes, the villagers look at her like she's walked right out of a legend. In some ways, she supposes she has. At first they keep their distance, but as time goes on, they slowly start to accept her as they have Lincoln and Octavia. Once again, her medical knowledge comes in handy. It feels good to be helping these people, even if they don't all know that the destruction of their village was partially her fault. Indra too readily accepts her help, which is a far cry from their first meeting when Indra called for the death of all the Sky People. In fact, the chief actually seems to be warming to Clarke and the others. Clarke has the strangest feeling that she could actually see herself becoming friends with Indra.

There's no sign of Lexa. According to Indra, she's off in Polis trying to hold her coalition together. Part of Clarke is glad for that. When she faces Lexa again, she wants it to be on her own terms. Indra casually suggests at one point that maybe the Sky People could send a delegation to Polis to show their strength before the clans. Marcus and Abby still don't want to get involved, but Clarke silently decides it might not be such a bad idea. This is their home now, which means they're already involved. Besides, she has to make peace with Lexa eventually.

She talks it over with Bellamy, Octavia, and Lincoln, and they decide that if the coalition is still a mess by the time fall arrives, then Clarke and Octavia will take a small group to Polis to show that the Sky People stand with Lexa. Clarke says it's because it's in their best interest to end the war going on around them, but secretly it's also because she's decided it's time she finds a way to forgive Lexa, for her own sanity if nothing else. She can't condemn the commander when she herself made the same choice. And judging from certain comments Indra has made, Lexa has never forgiven herself for betraying Clarke. Their friendship may be gone for good, but maybe Clarke can at least give them both some peace.

She also finds ways to spend time with Bellamy. He's in charge of the guard now and Kane and Abby have put him on the council, so a lot of his time is occupied. But they make it work. Sometimes he takes a late watch and he and Clarke sit outside the gate and talk about their lives. Sometimes they both go hunting together. Most nights they just meet up in the tent village to have a drink and talk about happenings in the camp while the other former delinquents cycle through their campfire. Bellamy ends up asking her advice on a lot of things, which definitely makes Clarke feel useful. As she settles into the routine of the camp, she's rather surprised to realize that part of her actually misses being in charge.

About a month after her return, she gets her chance at being a leader again. She's sitting by a fire in the tent village one night sketching a scene Harper is describing when Monty comes over to them with several of the other teenagers in tow. He sort of became the tent village's unofficial leader during Clarke's absence, and he has his authoritative face on now.

"We have a proposal that we'd like to discuss," Monty tells Clarke.

"Okay," she says slowly. The camp has suddenly fallen silent, and people are beginning to move closer. It's making her deeply suspicious. Something is definitely going on.

"We've taken a vote," Monty says. "And by 'we' I mean the residents of this little camp plus Raven, who somehow decided she gets a vote too."

"Damn right, I do," Raven calls from a nearby fire. The rest of the camp chuckles. Despite residing in her workroom in Camp Jaha proper, Raven still spends a lot of her evenings in the tent village. She says it's because the moonshine is better than Camp Jaha's alcohol, but everyone knows it's because she likes the company. Sometimes she even brings Wick, who has been accepted as something of a surrogate member of the group.

"Anyway," Monty says, trying to refocus everyone. "We took a vote, and we want you to represent us on the council."

"Wow," Clarke says in shock. She definitely hadn't seen that coming. She's not sure what to say. Finally she settles for, "Do we even get a representative?"

"We talked it over with your mom, and she said that since we're 'a functioning sub-group of the community,'" Monty says, clearly quoting Abby's terminology, "that our interests should be represented at the table."

"Well, what about Bellamy?" Clarke asks, glancing at where he sits a campfire over with Lincoln and Octavia.

"Since he's the head of the guard, he technically represents the defense side," Monty says. He glances over at Bellamy as well. "No offense."

"None taken," Bellamy says with a shrug.

"Besides," Miller says from behind Monty. "With both of you on it, we'd have two representatives."

"We could make sure our ideas get heard," Harper points out.

"We were down here first," Octavia says, looking over at Clarke. "I say it's time we get a real say around here."

"We want you back in charge," Monroe calls from somewhere behind Monty. A chorus of agreeing shouts rings out among the camp.

"The vote was unanimous," Monty tells Clarke.

"Unanimous?" she asks skeptically, thinking of Jasper. He's been fairly civil to her, but she can't see him voting for her.

Monty turns to look over his shoulder, and Jasper steps out of the pack with his hands jammed awkwardly in his pockets and his goggles perched atop his head.

"Unanimous," he says quietly. He shrugs. "You're the best choice for this."

That means more to Clarke than she can ever say. It's the closest he's come to forgiving her. But before she can get too worked up about it, Octavia butts in.

"Come on, Clarke," she says with a smile. "Give the people what they want."

Clarke smiles in spite of herself. The first time this group used that phrase, it was about trying to hang Murphy. They've come a long way since then. She's come a long way. Even so, she glances over at Bellamy for confirmation. He shrugs.

"Looking to you, princess," he says.

The entire camp seems to be holding its breath as they all wait for her decision.

"Okay," Clarke says finally. "I'll do it."

A chorus of cheers and claps rings out from the camp. Clarke laughs at the sheer amount of joy being displayed. Then the noise slowly begins to take form as wordless yells turn into chanting a single word over and over.

"Princess! Princess! Princess!"

"Alright!" Monty yells, bringing a halt to the yelling. "Drinks on us!"

That creates another round of excited cheers.

"Drinks are always on us," Jasper mutters. But there's a hint of a smile on his face.

The crowd of teenagers follows Monty and Jasper off in the direction of the still. Harper goes with them, leaving Clarke sitting alone. Bellamy gets up from his own fire and walks over to stand in front of her.

"So," he says. "How's it feel to be back in charge?"

"It feels pretty good," Clarke admits with a smile.

Bellamy holds up his cup of moonshine in a toast.

"Here's to you, princess," he says with a grin. "And whatever the hell you want."

Clarke laughs at that. They really have come a long way from that first ragged band of delinquents preaching anarchy. Now they have their own fully functional little society.

"We're going to need rules," she teases as she looks up at him.

"Oh?" Bellamy says, playing along. "And who makes those rules? You?"

"For now, we make the rules," Clarke says. Bellamy nods, a smile on his face.

"I can live with that," he says.

A series of cheers rings out as Monty and Jasper bring a jug of moonshine out of the hidden still. The sound makes Clarke's smile widen even further.

"Me too," she says.

X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X

Being a member of the council is interesting. Abby is still chancellor, and no one has even tried to dispute that. She is also extremely proud to welcome her daughter to the table. Kane represents most of Camp Jaha with Bellamy standing in as defensive advisement, and Clarke represents the former delinquents. It's nice to be in a leadership position that doesn't require brutal sacrifices at every turn. Instead, issues brought to the council table tend to deal more with things like should they try to plant crops next year or is there a better way to supply the camp with water. There are still disciplinary issues, of course, but Abby handles most of those herself. That leaves Clarke free to use her mind to solve problems.

Being on the council also gives her an excuse to make trips to Tondc or to spend time in Raven's workroom supplying ideas for new contraptions. Her drawing project gets moved to the evenings now, but she's still working on it. And it's getting close to finished. Between all of that and her shifts in the infirmary, it feels like Clarke has finally found her place in the world.

But there's still one ghost she needs to face. While the nightmares have all but vanished, there are still moments when she looks at a face and all she sees is Maya or Dante or a little boy kicking a ball. It's usually just for a second or two, just long enough for her breath to catch or her smile to freeze. And she can usually cover it up before anyone notices.

Well, almost anyone. Raven or Octavia always notice if they're in the vicinity, probably because they're looking for it, and they always take her for a drink afterwards while they hold seemingly casual conversation and pretend not to be assessing her emotional state. Not that Clarke minds. It's actually kind of nice to know that they're keeping an eye on her. Bellamy notices too, but he never says anything. And that's also nice in its own way because he trusts that she'll tell him if her demons get too strong to fight alone, and until then he's willing to give her privacy. Abby can also read Clarke's face too well not to miss the freezes. She asks about it the first few times, but after that she just quietly slips her hand into Clarke's and gives it a gentle squeeze to let her daughter know she's there. And usually that's enough. On the days when it's not, Clarke slips into her mother's room after dark and they sit together on the bed and talk about it or don't until Clarke falls asleep on Abby's shoulder. But usually that brief contact is enough to anchor her to the present.

But regardless of who notices, those brief seconds of panic are still there, and Clarke can only think of one way to finally make them stop. She needs to go back to Mount Weather. She needs to go back to the control room and stand in the spot where she doomed three hundred and forty-one people. She needs to look that demon in the eyes and finally make her peace with it.

She leaves one morning before sunrise without telling anyone. She does make a point of leaving a note in her tent so no one panics. But if she had stopped to say something, then one of her well-meaning friends would have tried to go with her. And this is something she needs to do alone. So she slips silently out of the tent village and heads down the road.

The walk is a long one, but it gives Clarke time to prepare herself. She won't have a task to distract herself this time. It'll be just her and the mountain. The thought causes her heart to race a little. Tondc was one thing. As Ronan pointed out, that wasn't directly her fault. But Mount Weather was. She murdered three hundred and forty-one people. And she needs to face that head-on if she ever wants to have peace.

The giant door to Mount Weather is as menacing as ever. Clarke stops in front of it for a moment to pull herself together. Standing there looking up at it reminds her of that night all those months ago when she stood there alone after everyone else walked away. In that moment, she had never imagined that she was about to end an entire civilization. But she did. And it's time to finally come to terms with that.

She sets her teeth and goes inside.

It's deathly quiet as Clarke makes her way to the control room. In spite of all the supplies the mountain still holds, no one has dared to move in. There's just something haunting about this place that causes even the animals to steer clear.

All too soon, Clarke finds herself standing outside the door to the control room. On her previous visits to Mount Weather she had only ducked in here long enough to retrieve Dante's body, and even that had taken a great deal of mental preparation. Now she takes a deep breath and lets it out, her hands clenching and unclenching at her sides. Then she forces herself to reach out and open the door.

The giant screens are blank as she steps into the room. The wiring must have shorted out while she was gone. But she can still remember exactly what those screens displayed when she decided to condemn the entire mountain to death. She can still see her mother on that table with the rest of her people chained to the walls. Her throat tightens up just thinking of it.

And then her eyes fall on the lever. She walks slowly across the room until she's standing beside it. It's hard to imagine that something so small could kill so many people. Clarke reaches out a trembling hand and sets it on the lever. Bellamy may have put his hand on hers that fateful day, but it was Clarke's decision. The responsibility for what happened is hers alone.

She closes her eyes as she lets the magnitude of it wash over her. With a flick of her wrist, she killed three hundred and forty-one people. It might have been the necessary choice, but that doesn't make it any easier to think about. There were children here. Children who dreamed of seeing the ground just like Clarke once did. And now they're gone.

A single tear runs down her cheek.

"You did the right thing," a quiet voice says.

Clarke's head jerks up and her eyes fly open to see Jasper standing in the doorway.

"What are you doing here?" she asks, quickly wiping at her damp eyes.

"I saw you leaving," Jasper admits. "I thought you were, well, leaving leaving. But then I found the note in your tent, and I just… I didn't want you to be here alone."

"It's almost an eight hour walk," Clarke points out in confusion.

"I know," Jasper says. "I've made it a lot."

"You walked eight hours so I didn't have to be here alone?" Clarke asks. Her eyes are watering again, and this time it's for a completely different reason.

"You're my friend," Jasper says honestly.

Clarke lets out a shaky breath as her tears threaten to overthrow. Jasper takes one slow, uncertain step into the room and then another.

"There's something I need to say to you," he says. He's wringing his hands the way he does when he's nervous. "I was mad at you for a long time. I thought I hated you. I couldn't understand how you could just kill all those people. How you could kill Maya." He has to pause briefly as his emotions threaten to get the better of him. "But then I thought about Finn. You loved him. We all know you did. And you could've tried to save him that night, but you didn't. You killed him because you knew we needed the alliance. You've always done what has to be done for the rest of us. And that's exactly what you did here."

He looks around the room and shakes his head. Clarke waits with baited breath.

"You were right," Jasper says finally as he meets her eyes again. He looks close to tears himself now. "Killing Cage never would've stopped them. They still would've killed us all. It was us or them. All of them. Including Maya."

"We could've saved her," Clarke says. Her voice is hoarse with tears that are threatening to overflow. "We could've donated our marrow."

"She never would've taken it," Jasper says with a sad smile. "You know what she said to me when she was dying? She said, 'None of us is innocent.' And she was right. They'd all taken the blood treatment. They all knew what was happening here. They were all guilty."

"Not the children," Clarke says. A silent tear runs down her face as she says it. "They didn't know any better."

"But they still needed the blood to survive," Jasper reminds her. "What were we gonna to do, keep killing ourselves so they could live? It had to stop somewhere, Clarke. All you did was choose when. Yeah, I lost Maya. And that still hurts. Maybe it always will. But if you hadn't thrown that lever, I would've lost everyone else too. This was the only way. You did what had to be done to save us. Because that's what you do. What you always do. You save everyone."

Clarke shakes her head. Tears are trickling down her cheeks in earnest now. Jasper crosses the rest of the room to stand beside her. There are tears in his own eyes as well.

"I used to tell myself that I would never forgive you for this," he says honestly. "But then I realized there's nothing to forgive. What you did saved us. It saved me. And you did it more than just here. I owe you my life. We all do. You're not a bad person, Clarke. You're a good person who's had to do bad things to keep her people alive. But you gotta find a way to forgive yourself, or this is going to eat you alive."

"I can't," Clarke chokes through her tears. "I've tried, but I can't."

Her voice breaks over the last word as she finally gets too emotional to speak.

"Then let someone else do it for you," Jasper says.

Before Clarke can figure out what he means by that, he reaches out and slowly lays his hand atop hers on the lever. She sucks in a sharp breath at the gesture. It occurs to her that they've finally come full circle. On her first day out of quarantine, she stood in this mountain with her hand on another lever and Jasper begged her not to pull it. But now here he is with his hand on hers. It's almost too much for Clarke to take.

Jasper looks up as a single tear runs down his face.

"Thank you," he whispers sincerely.

That's where Clarke finally loses it. She pulls her hand away from the lever and instead wraps her arms around Jasper's neck. He hugs her back as she begins to weep into his shoulder. She can feel tears hitting her jacket as he starts to cry too. They're both holding onto each other as if they'll never let go. Clarke has no idea how long they stand there crying together. It really doesn't matter. They both need this moment of healing. But finally they calm down somewhat. Jasper pulls away, his face streaked with tears, and looks Clarke right in the eyes.

"You're not alone," he says.

"Neither are you," Clarke says hoarsely as she wipes her wet cheeks.

Jasper looks around the room briefly before returning his watery gaze to Clarke.

"Let's go home," he says.

He holds out his hand and Clarke takes it.

X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X

As summer fades into autumn, the day comes that marks the one year anniversary of the hundred coming to Earth. To be perfectly honest, it sort of sneaks up on them. It hardly seems possible that they've been on the ground a full year. Despite the fact that their original trip down to the ground was barely shy of a death sentence, the former delinquents declare it a holiday. Abby responds by giving all of Camp Jaha the day off to celebrate. Somehow it gets dubbed Landing Day and the name sticks.

Clarke can't remember who exactly suggested they all visit the drop ship, but when the day rolls around, all forty-five of the former delinquents plus Bellamy, Raven, and Lincoln are gathered outside of the gate to the tent village. (Lincoln was hesitant at first, but the others have accepted him as one of their own. Besides, he was part of what went on there too. And while Raven may not have come down with the others, she is definitely one of them.) Abby and Kane had offered to go with them, as had a few of the small handful of surviving parents whose children had been among the original hundred. But Clarke had told them all this was something the teenagers needed to do alone.

It's about a four-hour walk to the drop ship. The walk is filled with conversation and occasionally even laughter. It occurs to Clarke that a group this size might look like a war party if it weren't for their light tones and expressions. The fact that they're Sky People causes the Grounders to stay out of sight, so it feels like they have the woods to themselves as they walk.

The company makes the walk seem short. Before they know it, they're approaching the wall around the drop ship. They stop by the graves first for a moment of silence. Not all of their friends are buried here, but it doesn't matter. The sentiment holds. They've lost fifty-four of their own. Over half of them are gone. And they deserve a moment. Bellamy has all of the names memorized, and his lips move silently as he recites them one by one. He carries his own share of guilt just as Clarke does. But forty-eight of their people are still alive (forty-nine if Murphy's still breathing somewhere out there), and Clarke calls that a win.

Once they've finished paying their respects, they all trickle in through the gate into the yard around the drop ship. Plants have started to grow again where the blast of the rockets burned them all away. But otherwise it looks mostly the same. It's amazing that even after so many months this place can still cause a stirring of nostalgia in Clarke's chest.

Octavia is at the front of the pack with Lincoln by her side. She crosses her arms over her chest and gives the drop ship an approving nod.

"We're back, bitches," she says with a smile. A ripple of smiles runs through the group as they all remember the moment when her feet first hit the ground.

"You want to say something?" Bellamy asks, looking over at Clarke.

"Okay," Clarke says. She makes her way to the front of the group and turns around to face them. Then she pauses to gather her thoughts. Everyone waits in patient silence.

"One year ago today," Clarke finally begins, "the Ark sent down a group of teenage criminals to find out if the ground was survivable. Honestly, there were times when I wasn't sure we would survive the week, let alone a full month. But here we are a year later. Against all odds, we survived. True, not all of us made it. But many of us did. We were sent down here to die. But instead we built a life. We made this ground ours with our blood and sweat and tears. We earned the right to live down here. Every single one of us. We are all of us warriors. We may be from the sky, but we belong down here just as much as the Grounders. This is our ground now. Our home. And we are not just the hundred anymore. We are not criminals, and we are not citizens of the Ark. We are Sky People. And we are here to stay."

The former delinquents gathered before her burst into loud cheers.

"Damn right, we are!" Raven's voice calls above the noise. Clarke chuckles at the comment, and some of the others do too.

Bellamy steps forward with a proud smile as the rest of the group dissolves into nostalgic conversation and fond laughter. He stops to stand behind Clarke, turning around to survey their people with her.

"I couldn't have said it better myself," he says.

"I don't know," Clarke tells him with a barely concealed grin. "You're whole 'we are Grounders' speech was pretty convincing."

"Maybe," Bellamy says, shrugging. "But as you so eloquently pointed out, we're not Grounders. We're Sky People. And I don't know about you, but I'd rather be that any day."

"Me too," Clarke agrees.

X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X

When they get back to camp that afternoon, Raven and Wick bring out the book. They've finally finished compiling all of Clarke and Lincoln's work, and they formally present the thick volume to Clarke shortly before sundown. All of the delinquents gather around to watch as Clarke flips slowly through it. The book starts with drawings of each of the delinquents plus Bellamy, Raven, and Lincoln. Names are written beneath the images. Then the book launches right into the story, running from the moment the drop ship left the ark up until just a few days previous. All of the drawings, which are now colored by water colors, have been placed in chronological order. A few of them have a quick line of text on the bottom, usually a quote or short phrase. But for the most part, the story is told strictly in pictures. And what a story it is.

The book's front cover has a plate of metal on top, and someone from engineering has engraved it. The metal sheet holds an image of the drop ship with Earth behind it. Across the top of the cover is carved "The Sky People" and beneath that in slightly smaller letters "Year 1."

"I'm planning on there being a year two," Raven explains with a shrug.

After that, the tent village turns into one large party. Monty and Jasper have been storing up moonshine for weeks, and there is more than enough to get everyone good and drunk. Miller, Monroe and Harper organize some games, including a three-legged race that causes no shortage of laughter. Lincoln is already established as the king of hand-to-hand sparring, but that doesn't stop several of the delinquents from taking him on once the alcohol in their blood starts kicking in. There's dancing as well. Some of the former delinquents have managed to create functioning instruments over the last few months, and they play fresh music with a good beat. All in all, everyone seems pretty happy.

It's well into the night when Clarke finds Bellamy leaning against the fence watching the festivities. She holds out one of the two cups of moonshine she's carrying, and he takes it.

"Where you been?" he asks curiously.

"Talking with my mom," Clarke says as she leans back against the fence beside him.

"About what?" Bellamy asks.

"Polis," Clarke says. "Octavia and I leave at the end of the week."

"Your mom's okay with that?" Bellamy asks in surprise. Clarke shrugs.

"The Grounders have left us alone so far, but if a new commander takes charge, that might change," she says. "My mom understands the advantages of not letting that happen."

"Or she knows who's really in charge," Bellamy says with a hint of a smile.

Clarke shakes her head at his teasing and takes a drink of her moonshine, making a mild face as she does so. She always forgets how strong that stuff is.

"What about you?" Bellamy asks. "You ready for this?"

"Ready as I'll ever be," Clarke says. "It's been almost a year since Mount Weather. Besides, I have to face her sooner or later."

"She left us all to die, Clarke," Bellamy points out. "No one would blame you if you can't forgive that."

"I can't blame her for choosing her people," Clarke says, glancing up at him briefly. "I did the same thing when I wiped out Mount Weather."

Her gaze drifts to the former delinquents dancing in the firelight a short distance away. Monty has just pulled Harper into the mix, and they're both laughing. Jasper is watching from a short distance away. He's sitting alone, but there's a smile on his face as he watches his best friend. He really is going to be okay.

"Lexa was your friend," Bellamy says, drawing Clarke back to their conversation.

"I don't know what she was," Clarke admits. "But whatever we were, I need to deal with it. And so does she." She looks down at the cup of moonshine in her hand. "I talked to Indra yesterday after she got back. She says Lexa still beats herself up over what she did."

"Good," Bellamy says.

"Not good," Clarke corrects with a frown. "It's eating her alive, just like Mount Weather did me. Sooner or later she's going to crack, and when she does, the coalition will shatter. Indra says some of the rival leaders are just waiting for a chance to make their move. Showing that we stand with Lexa could give her side the strength it needs to stay in power, which would stop a war we don't want. Besides, she needs to know that I forgive her. It's the only way she'll be able to move one."

"And do you?" Bellamy asks quietly. "Forgive her?"

Clarke is silent for a moment as she thinks it over.

"Yes," she says with a nod. "I didn't think I ever could. But I know what she's going through. I know what it's like to blame yourself for a mistake. To do something you know is wrong because you have to put your people first. The difference is that I got to walk away. I had you and my mom keeping an eye on our people. I could take the time to heal. Lexa never got that. Her guilt is still destroying her. And maybe there was a time when I thought she deserved that, but now…"

She trails off for a moment, her gaze drifting over to where Jasper sits laughing at the sight of Monty trying to stumble through something resembling a dance. He isn't completely healed yet either. But his bright smile tells Clarke that someday he will be.

"We both made the same choice," Clarke continues. She looks over at Bellamy as she tries to make him understand what she's only just figured out. "And if I deserve forgiveness, then so does she. But I couldn't really forgive myself until I knew Jasper forgave me. It's the same with Lexa. She'll never be able to forgive herself until she knows I've forgiven her. And even if she could, this is something I need to do for myself. One last ghost to silence."

Part of her expects Bellamy to argue or press for certainty, but instead he just nods.

"Did you tell your mom all of that?" he asks with a hint of a smile.

"No," Clarke says, shaking her head. "She would've tried to talk me out of it. She never liked Lexa to begin with. She thinks this is a strictly diplomatic mission."

"You might be surprised," Bellamy tells her. He takes a sip of his moonshine. "Your mom's a smart lady. There's a reason she's the chancellor."

"Good point," Clarke agrees. "She wants there to be ten of us going to Polis. Octavia and I, plus we agreed on Lincoln and Kane. Monroe already volunteered, and so did Miller and his dad, so that's seven."

"Make it eight," Bellamy says. Clarke gives him a questioning look, so he adds, "I'm coming too."

"As much as I appreciate that, I need you here," Clarke says. "Miller's dad is the second in command of the guard, and Kane and I are half the council. That's half of Camp Jaha's government. I need you to stay and help my mom run things while we're away."

"Fine," Bellamy says. "But if I do, you have to promise me that you're coming back. I spent six months not knowing if you would. I'm not doing that again."

Clarke knows from talking with Octavia that her absence was hard on Bellamy, but this is the first time he's really brought up how it made him feel.

"I promise," she says sincerely.

"Then I'll stay," Bellamy says. Now it's his turn to look out at their people celebrating. "This place isn't the same without you."

"Well, then I'll try to hurry back," Clarke says.

Any reply Bellamy might have made is cut off by a loud pop and a whizzing sound. A second later there's an explosion of color in the dark sky above Camp Jaha. The majority of the tent village stops what they're doing and looks up at the brilliant burst. Exclamations of awe ripple through the camp. There's another streak of smoke as the sound repeats, and then another burst of color lights up the sky.

"Looks like Raven finally got those fireworks figured out," Bellamy says with a smile. Clarke is smiling too as she looks up at yet another flash of color.

"It's beautiful," she says.

"You asked me once if we could wish on this kind of shooting star," Bellamy says, looking over at her as color continues to explode across the sky.

"I remember," Clarke says with a nod. "You said you didn't know what to wish for."

"Well, I do now," Bellamy says. He turns his head to look back up at the sky. The exploding colors dance across his face. "I'd wish for this next year to be a good one. That our people would be safe. That we'd make the most of the second chance we've been given."

"That's a pretty good wish," Clarke tells him. Bellamy just shrugs. Clarke tilts her head curiously as a thought occurs to her. "So does this mean you think the rockets count?"

"I think it doesn't matter," Bellamy says honestly. He looks down at her with a serious expression. "If this year taught me anything, it's to not underestimate our people. Whatever comes, we'll get through it just like always."

"Careful," Clarke teases. "I might start thinking you're an optimist."

"That's your job," Bellamy tells her with a hint of a smile.

"Well, nobody died today, so we're already off to a better start than last year," Clarke tells him brightly.

"Don't jinx it, princess," Bellamy warns. "The night's not over yet."

Clarke laughs at that. As another flash of color lights up the night sky, she decides that Bellamy's right. It doesn't matter what comes. She has her people, and that's enough. They'll find a way to deal with whatever the ground decides to throw at them.

Bellamy looks over at her and holds up his half-full cup of moonshine in a toast.

"To the future," he says. "And whatever it may bring."

"To the future," Clarke echoes.

They clink their cups together.

* * *

***Special Note**: A HUGE thank you to everyone who voted for this story in the Bellarke Fanfiction Awards! It's such an honor to have won my category, and I could not have done it without all of you. Several of you have expressed interest in seeing a Bellamy version of this story, and I wanted to let you know that it's definitely happening. Consider it a thank-you gift for all of your support, both in this contest and outside of it. It may be a week or so before I start posting just because my life is about to get a little hectic. But I've already started work on it, so hopefully it'll go up soon. Keep an eye out. And thanks again for all the support. You guys are amazing. :)

Well, that brings us to the end of this story. Before you go, please take a second to leave one last review about this chapter or the story as a whole. And if you liked this story, feel free to check out my other stories for this fandom. I'm not sure yet whether or not I want to write something about Clarke and Lexa meeting in Polis. It'll depend on whether or not I can come up with a good enough plot. But we've got a good long while until season 3, so who knows? In the meantime, check out this story's companion piece "Those Who Wait". It looks at thirteen different characters (one chapter per character) as they deal with Clarke's absence and life post Mount Weather. But it ties pretty heavily in with this story and shows a few of the events from the point of view of other characters. And as always, thanks for reading!


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